Upload
others
View
5
Download
0
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Degree of Master in Textile Management with specialization in Fashion Management
Report no. 2014.11.14
FASHION BRANDS ON
SOCIAL MEDIA: Why consumers engage with companies
via social media
Author: Tamara Úblová Supervisor: Jenny Balkow
1
ABSTRACT
Title: Fashion brands on social media: Why consumers engage with companies via social
media
Background: The online consumer engagement is becoming very significant for companies
striving to build their relationship with their consumers. Social media gives an opportunity not
only to reach consumers in a passive way, but to engage them in active communication and
to upload content that is consequently updated and drawing followers´ attention. Successful
online consumer engagement can improve consumers’ loyalty and trust in the brand.
Therefore, it is important for a company to be aware of actions that can encourage consumer
engagement on social media. The goal of this study is to help marketers achieve higher
consumer engagement that will consequently lead to more loyal customers.
Research Questions:
1. Which are the key motives that encourage people to engage with fashion brands on
social media?
2. In what types of activities do consumers interact with fashion brands on social media?
Are those activities concerning a particular fashion brand related to willingness to buy
a product?
3. What motivates consumers to share content of fashion brands on social media? Is
sharing content interrelated with purchase decision?
Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to identify consumers’ motivations that encourage them
to engage with fashion brands on social media, to identify activities in which these consumers
interact with a particular fashion brand, and to find reasons that motivate consumers to share
content which appeared on the fashion brand´s pages with others. Furthermore, our research
tries to find out how this relationship between consumers and fashion brands can evolve.
Keywords: Social media, fashion industry, consumer behaviour, consumer engagement,
purchase intention
2
Table of contents List of figures: .................................................................................................................... 4
1. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................ 6
1.1. Background ............................................................................................................. 6
1.2. Problem discussion ................................................................................................. 7
1.3. Purpose ................................................................................................................... 8
1.4. Research questions ................................................................................................. 9
1.5. Contribution to the field ..........................................................................................10
1.6. Limitation and scope the study ...............................................................................11
1.7. Summarizing chapter one.......................................................................................11
2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK .....................................................................................12
2.1. Social media and brands ........................................................................................12
2.2. Social media and its users ......................................................................................14
2.3. Online brand communities ......................................................................................15
2.4. Consumer motives to engage on social media with fashion brands ........................16
2.5. Online community usage behaviour .......................................................................18
2.6. Community engagement on social media ...............................................................19
2.7. Brand trust and brand loyalty ..................................................................................21
2.8. Summary of this chapter ........................................................................................22
3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY .....................................................................................24
3.1. Research strategy ..................................................................................................24
3.2. Data collection ........................................................................................................25
3.3. Questionnaire development ....................................................................................25
3.4. Sampling ................................................................................................................27
3.5. Validity ...................................................................................................................29
3.6. Reliability ................................................................................................................29
3.7. Summary of this chapter ........................................................................................30
4. Empirical results ............................................................................................................31
4.1. Respondents’ characteristics ..................................................................................31
3
4.2. Social media demographics related to fashion brands ............................................33
4.3. Research question 1 ..............................................................................................34
4.4. Research question 2 ..............................................................................................38
4.5. Research questions 3 .............................................................................................44
5. ANALYSIS .....................................................................................................................48
5.1. Activities of fans .....................................................................................................48
5.2. Activity of fans versus buying the product ...............................................................49
5.3. Real life consequences of sharing content .............................................................50
5.4. As a consequence of sharing content to be active in real life ..................................52
5.5. Reasons of being active online (sharing content) versus reasons for purchasing a
fashion product .................................................................................................................53
5.6. The difference between active and passive fans ....................................................55
6. DISCUSSION ................................................................................................................57
6.1. Which are the key motives that encourage people to engage with fashion brands on
social media? ....................................................................................................................57
6.2. In what types of activities do consumers interact with fashion brands on social media?
Are those activities concerning a particular fashion brand related to willingness to buy a
product? ............................................................................................................................58
6.3. What motivate consumers to share content of fashion brands on social media? Is
sharing content interrelated with purchase decision? ........................................................59
7. CONCLUSION ..............................................................................................................60
7.1. Research summary ................................................................................................60
7.2. Practical contributions to fashion brands ................................................................61
7.3. Future reseach .......................................................................................................64
8. APPENDIX ....................................................................................................................66
8.1. Social media usage ................................................................................................66
8.2. Consumers’ motives to interact with fashion companies on social media ...............70
8.3. Personal statistics ..................................................................................................71
8.4. Questions of the survey ..........................................................................................73
Bibliography: .....................................................................................................................82
4
List of figures:
Figure 1: Three basic tools for social media marketing .........................................................14
Figure 2 : Web 2.0, social media and creative consumers ....................................................15
Figure 3: Interdependence of people's consuming, participating, and producing on user-
generated media ..................................................................................................................19
Figure 4: Conceptual model of the process of consumer engagement .................................23
Figure 5: Cross tabulation of gender and age .......................................................................31
Figure 6: Cross tabulation of gender and highest degree or level school ..............................32
Figure 7: Cross tabulation of gender and employment status ...............................................32
Figure 8: Crosstabulation of visits of fashion companies online and gender .........................33
Figure 9: Cross tabulation of gender and social media platforms ..........................................33
Figure 10: Reasons for following social media ......................................................................36
Figure 11: Motives to be a follower of fashion brands ...........................................................37
Figure 12: Comparison of motives to follow fashion brands online .......................................38
Figure 13: Social media activities .........................................................................................39
Figure 14: The comparison of consuming activities ..............................................................39
Figure 15: The comparison of consuming activities ..............................................................40
Figure 16: Interconnection of consuming activities ...............................................................41
Figure 17: Responding to fans´ comments ...........................................................................42
Figure 18: Participating in competitions ................................................................................43
Figure 19: Putting a comment on the brand´s wall ................................................................44
Figure 20: The reasons to sharing content ...........................................................................45
Figure 21: Motivation to share content ..................................................................................46
Figure 22: Final conceptual model of the process of consumer engagement ........................61
Figure 23: Visual content ......................................................................................................62
Figure 24: The post in the form of competitions ....................................................................63
Figure 25: Using of questions ...............................................................................................64
Figure 26: Following companies on social media ..................................................................66
Figure 27: The type of social media platform using for following brands on social media ......66
Figure 28: The reason for not using social media for following brands ..................................67
Figure 29: The media used for searching information about brands .....................................68
Figure 30: The number of followed companies on social media ............................................69
Figure 31: The frequency of visits of followed fashion brands on social media .....................69
Figure 32: The influence by online experience to buy products ............................................70
Figure 33: The number of people who share content ............................................................70
5
Figure 34: The perception of marketing activities of fashion companies on social media ......71
Figure 35: Gender characteristic ..........................................................................................71
Figure 36: Age characteristic ................................................................................................72
Figure 37: The education characteristic ................................................................................72
6
1. INTRODUCTION
In the introductory chapter the author discusses the topic of social media user’s motivation to
follow fashion brands and their following engagement with these brands. The author outlines
the main research objectives and states contributions as well as limitations of the thesis.
1.1. Background
Over the last decade the digital innovations have dramatically changed the way of consumer’s
communication with each other, the way of finding and exchanging information about products
and the way of their buying and consuming. Internet is now a major source of information that
helps consumers to decide more easily during their shopping (Valerio, 2014). The new media
channels such as Facebook, Youtube, Google and Twitter placed the consumers in a more
active role as market players and enabled them to reach and (be reached by) everyone
anywhere and anytime (Henning-Thurau et. al, 2010).
Social media is considered as an ideal landscape for building communities (Habibi, Laroche
and Richard, 2014) that enable users and companies to socialize and that facilitate content
accessibility to the public (Colliander and Dahlén, 2011). Social media has gradually become
a part of our daily lives. Networked computers and the communications brought huge social
changes. Networked computers enabled people around the world to ignore geography and
time boundaries, and to find others and bring them together in groups founded on the basis of
a large range of cultural and subcultural interests and social relationships (Kozinets, 1999).
This ability of building communities raised interest in social media as a marketing tool, and
nowadays the discussion about marketing strategy and advertising would not be complete
without thinking of the exploitation of social media. Each year, marketers perceive social media
as a more important marketing tool than the year before. In 2014 92% marketers agreed that
social media is important for their businesses. Therefore, it is absolutely logic that tactics of
the social media marketing and ways how to increase customers´ online engagement with the
brand are areas with great deal of interest. Around 89% of marketers want to find the most
powerful tactics and know the best way to interact with their community on social media
(STELZNER, 2014), because the companies which understand their consumers are able to
position themselves better on the market, and then to benefit from the constant changes of the
ways in which the consumption and purchase decisions are made (Kozinets, 1999). Brands
started to monitor customer’s behaviour on social platforms to find out what are the customers’
7
preferences.. Nowadays, thanks to the online platforms, business became more about keeping
up with the customers in real-time. The era when companies were in control of the brand
conversation is gone (Rumsey and Saunter, 2013). The brands want to understand
consumers’ motivation for online activity in order to be able to influence consumer’s
engagement in conversation on their social media platforms (Wolny and Mueller, 2013).
The brands realized that social media does not only provide an opportunity to reach consumers
in a passive way (informational messages), but it also enables companies to engage with their
consumers through active communication. Such a successful engagement can lead to
improvement of the attributes of the brand and it can attract more customers believing in a
given brand. Such customers can consequently engage in advocating for a particular brand
(Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite, 2012). Furthermore, since consumer engagement was
evaluated as able to influence consumer decision to buy or not to buy, it shifted even more in
the centre of attention of all marketers (Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite, 2012). According to
Habibi, Laroche and Richard (2014) the role of active online engagement of a customer is a
very significant variable in social media and the major aim of being present on social media is
to obtain a higher share of consumers’ attention and engagement.
The users of social network may interact with the company in many various ways: by sharing
opinions, creating valuable content and news, supporting marketing campaigns etc., but they
can also communicate with each other. These interactions are very important from the
perspective of companies, because such active customers build the brand by increasing
awareness, involvement, and engagement and therefore they stimulate purchases. For this
reason, the companies have to continuously develop new ways to interact with their customers,
build strong relationships, and increase social engagement to drive growth (Mohr, 2013).
1.2. Problem discussion
The change in consumption behaviour due to social media is impressive. The influence of
social media and Internet has grown and increasingly continues to grow. The potential of social
media was discovered and explored by brands of every field. Naturally, fashion brands were
no exception. Companies started to join social media, because they realized the opportunity
not only to reach consumers, but to interact with them through active communication.
Furthermore, according to Hollebeek (2011) the growing interest in the concept of consumer
brand engagement is mainly driven by the anticipated benefits and its capability in consumer
relationship outcomes such as trust, loyalty and commitment. Due to these possible effects
8
brands started to flood social media and the environment became significantly competitive.
Each fashion brand competes for audiences’ attention not only with other fashion brands, but
also with other entities that might include posts from family, friends, celebrities and other
brands in different market areas. Given such a huge level of competition, and the development
and growth of new posts to reach the consumers and to engage them with a fashion brand has
become a significant challenge.
Therefore, the author believes that an increased understanding of online consumer’s
behaviour and motives that encourage consumers to interact with a particular fashion brand,
and the consumer’s consequent engagement with that brand, can bring ideas for new
marketing strategies and practices leading to improved consumer-targeting. Furthermore, the
author believes that a thorough analysis of consequences of consumer engagement has the
potential to show whether it pays off for the fashion brand to focus on consumer engagement
on social media.
The author chose this field of study not only because of her interest in fashion, but also on the
basis of the fact that fashion e-commerce business has gradually become the most developing
area on the Internet with double digit growth rates year after year (Hansen and Bjorn-Andersen,
2013). Furthermore, the fashion brands are one of the largest business entities in the social
media ecosystem with for instance an average Facebook Page fan base of 356 753 users,
which is a much higher than an average number of brands’ fans in other industries (Inspiration
from the Fashion Industry On Social Media, 2014).
Nonetheless, it is important to acknowledge that the context of online social media and
consumer behaviour have already become of great interest to researchers. However, the
author notices the lack of research focusing specifically on consumer behaviour on social
media within fashion industry. Hence, the main objective of this study is to bridge this gap by
conceptualizing consumer brand engagement with fashion brands on online social media
platforms, and to help us better understand the motivation of consumers in order to reach and
engage them more effectively.
1.3. Purpose
The purpose of this thesis is first to identify consumers’ motives that encourage them to engage
with fashion brands on social media, second to identify activities in which these consumers
interact with a particular fashion brand and third to find reasons that motivate consumers to
9
share content that appeared on the fashion brand pages with other users of social media and
finally to understand how can this relationship between consumers and fashion brands evolve.
In the course of the paper, the author intends to offer insight into consumers’ mind sets
regarding online interactivity with fashion brands in order to develop successful future
marketing strategies concerning higher consumer engagement that leads to the creation of the
loyal consumer base.
1.4. Research questions
1. Which are the key motives that encourage people to engage with fashion brands on
social media?
2. In what types of activities do consumers interact with fashion brands on social media?
Are those activities concerning a particular fashion brand related to willingness to buy
a product?
3. What motivates consumers to share content of fashion brands on social media? Is
sharing content interrelated with purchase decision?
10
1.5. Contribution to the field
Recent social media research has increasingly started to focus on understanding the impact
of social media usage on brands and the possibility to benefit from it (Dellarocas, 2003, Moran,
2010). Poyry, Parvinen and Malmivaara (2013) examine the relationship between usage
behaviour and purchase intention, whereas Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite study (2012) focus
on brand building, their study analyses how consumers should be engaged in communication
on social media in order to build brand equity. The concept of consumer engagement in social
media is becoming increasingly explored by scholars, because it is a relevant topic regarding
social media that offers brands an opportunity to be more visible and to interact with their
consumers. The interactivity through social media enables a brand to maintain conversation
with consumers, and to engage them in content and brand equity building. These interactions
lead to raised brand awareness, increase positive brand associations and build consumer
loyalty to the brand (Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite, 2012). Consumer engagement in virtual
space was studied in various aspects, for instance by researching which factors encourage
and motivate consumer engagement (Krishnamurthy and Dou, 2008; Shao, 2009, Park et al.,
2009) and through which actions can organizations better engage with consumers (De Vries,
Gensler and Leeflang, 2012). The concept of engagement is analysed through consideration
of the activities (Heinonen, 2011), cultural differences (Muk, Chung and Kim, 2014) and the
specifics of companies (Brodie et al., 2013). The study by Baird and Parasnis (2011) examines
the willingness of consumers to join companies on social media and its results show clearly
that there is a gap between what companies think consumers like and what consumers seek
on social media in reality. Nevertheless, none of the studies mentioned above have focused
on the fashion industry. Thus, for the purpose of this paper the author will assume that motives,
which were identified by previous researchers are also valid in fashion industry. Besides, this
study also strives to contribute to this research area with the identification of new patterns of
online consumer behaviour related to fashion brands on social media. Moreover, the aim of
this study is to identify a systematic approach of consumer engagement with its specific
consequences for the fashion industry. This study contributes to the existing research on social
media and online brand communities related to fashion industry. The findings reported in this
research give a preliminary understanding of consumer behaviour in social media
environments of fashion brands.
11
The author is persuaded that the variety of theories used in this thesis along with its empirical
part discuss the topic of social media within fashion industry in the unique and valuable way.
Furthermore, the researcher believes that due to a recently increasing interest in social media
and especially in consumer engagement the topic is a relevant subject of study and of analyse
in the context of fashion brands to bridge the gap in this area.
1.6. Limitation and scope the study
The study focuses on consumers who follow brands on social media and in particular case of
fashion brands. Whereas the study’s aim is to find the reason why consumers share the
content, the study is at the same time limited by people who are active fans of fashion brands
and share picture, video or just comment with others. The study is not addressed to any
specific demographic group, however, the data gathered through the questionnaire include
significantly higher number of female respondents compared to men and the same happened
in age group, because the study failed to collect data from people who are older than 35 years.
Despite the fact that the study was not limited to any social media platforms, Facebook
belonged to the most mentioned tools for following brands, therefore the author is not able to
distinguish between consumer behaviour on Facebook and the rest of social media platforms.
Hence, there is a space for further research on analyse the differences of consumer
engagement between users of different social media sites.
1.7. Summarizing chapter one
Online consumer engagement is becoming very important and the author observes that there
seems to be an increasing interest in that topic especially among fashion brands, where the
competition looks one of the strongest on social media. Therefore, the increased knowledge
of consumers’ motives to engage with fashion brands and their activities will be without any
doubt very useful for creating new marketing strategies. The next chapter will describe the
existing scholarly research, which was used in this study.
12
2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
This chapter offers a review of relevant and supporting theories that form the theoretical
framework of the study. The theories are then used for answering the research question and
increase the credibility of this paper.
2.1. Social media and brands
Kim and Ko (2012) quoted according to Richter and Koch (2007) define social media as online
applications, platforms and media which facilitate interactions, collaborations and the sharing
of the content. Social media is being used by almost all companies regardless of their size or
their type of business to advertise and promote themselves. The number of companies with
an account on social media continues to grow (Saravanakumar and Suganthalakshmi, 2012).
Many companies start to use social media in marketing, public communication or a similar
department, where it is necessary to ensure to have a direct link between company and
customers. Customers can engage with companies for example by posting comments on
companies’ profiles. Furthermore, it is a way to increase awareness among customers who
are beyond reach of traditional media. In short, many companies are searching for customer
engagement and they see social media as the way to do it (Evans and Mckee, 2010).
Social media cannot be described without understanding the notion of Web 2.0, which
represents a way in which Internet users use the World Wide Web, a space where content is
steadily changed by all operators in a sharing and collaborative way (Paquette, 2013). The
development of Web 2.0. technologies that make it easy for consumers to form and publish
content, to share ideas, to vote on them and to recommend them to others had big impact on
marketing that had to reflect those developments. The advertising and promotional information
are not the only source of information about products anymore. Furthermore, social media
enabled consumers to share information about products and brands among themselves and
therefore social media users are often influenced by the experiences of others before they
themselves decide to buy certain product (Evans and Mckee, 2010).
The usage of social media was initially challenging for fashion brands. They were worried how
their brand would be perceived since being available on social media seemed as almost too
much for them because they felt too much exposed (Morriseey, 2010). However, today
advertising and marketing strategy would definitely be inadequate without using social media.
The time when fashion shows were a closed events only for buyers and press without any
celebrities in the front row, is gone. The collections are now presented not only to the chosen
13
few, but to all customers around the world-thanks to the advanced technology (Wylie, 2012).
Furthermore, fashion lovers, who are hungry for the latest trends, do not have to rely on the
last edition of Vogue, because social media has enormously changed the situation of fashion
business. Followers of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or Pinterest accounts are flooded with
live-streams, tweets, posts and pins and they are informed about the latest trends immediately.
(Wwd, 2013). The old one-way communication through traditional media was replaced by
innovative interactive two-way communication and thus fashion companies that do not appear
on social media, definitively lose their competitive advantage (Costa, 2013). Furthermore,
according to Rudolf Kvíz, Product Marketing Manager of the company Socialbakers : “Fashion
and social media work together very well. People can talk about fashion industry very
spontaneously, they like showing off new items in their closet and therefore it is natural that
they are going to put their dream dresses on the wall of their profile. Moreover, pictures work
the best on social media and fashion products are very visual items and therefore the
connection of fashion and social media functions altogether”.
Brands and costumers started to communicate with each other without limitation of time or
place. The interactive two-way direct communication enabled brands and customers to
cooperate on development of new products, services, business models and values. The main
advantage of social media marketing is the opportunity to decrease misunderstanding and
prejudice towards brands and increase brand value by establishing a platform, where people
can exchange their ideas and information among themselves online (Kim and Ko, 2012).
Social media marketing is dependent on three major considerations. The first goal is to get the
fans or followers, but to have fans is not enough. The companies need to make a few steps to
preserve and improve the brand base, so that the company reaches a positive return on
investment for social media. Before anything else, companies have to communicate one core
message, because for instance on Facebook there are algorithms that decide which ads will
be shown to which friends, therefore if the company wants to reach its fans, followers or friends,
it needs to understand who its fans base consist of, and then secondly, to analyse who is
engaging with which ad. The better ad with better topic the company will post, the more
consumers will talk about that content. Those indirect messages will be sent to friends of fans
and that is one of the reasons why companies keep investing money in social media. Company
fans, followers or friends are spreading companies’ messages which leads to the higher final
impact of the company. Ideally, the company´s investments to social media become to return
(DLDconference, 2012).
14
Band (2012) adds that the brands need to be sure that they will reach the group of fans that is
engaged by and interacts with their content. It is crucial to publish content which keeps fans,
followers and friends interested in order to maximize the reach and depth of engagement on
social media. An active dialogue with fans ensures the understanding of consumer perceptions
of the brand due to analysis of the word-of-mouth conversations on social media. The
knowledge given by such an analysis can be used to promote the brand’s image, to respond
to exact customer service requirements and to explain misunderstanding and false rumours
that could damage brand reputation.
Figure 1: Three basic tools for social media marketing
2.2. Social media and its users
Over the last decade the digital innovations dramatically have changed the way consumers
communicate with each other, the way of finding and exchanging information about products,
and the way of their purchasing and consuming. New media channels such as Facebook,
Youtube, Google and Twitter placed the consumers in a more active role as market players,
and enabled consumers to reach (and be reached by) everyone anywhere and anytime
(Henning-Thurau et. al, 2010). Information technology is empowering consumers and their role
is changing from passive recipients of information to active generators of information. The
activities formerly controlled by companies start to be performed more and more by consumers
(Heinonen, 2011). Therefore, the companies developed a need to understand this change in
order to be able to profit from using social media.
15
Figure 2 : Web 2.0, social media and creative consumers (Source: Berthon et al., 2012)
As seen in Figure, Web 2.0 can be perceived as the technical base that helps to create
consumer-generated content and to emerge the social phenomena of shared media. In short,
Web 2.0 enables the creation and transportation of the content that is social media (Berthon
et al., 2012). Creative consumers are becoming the new centrum of value in Web 2.0. They
are those, who add the content on social media and then produce much more value compared
to companies. Their networks of friends and fellows compose the meaning of social. Creative
consumers drive this new media world. The market-place frequently refers to social media as
user-generated content (UGC) or consumer-generated media (CGM). However, it is necessary
to differ between the media and the consumers. The media such as Facebook, Instagram, and
Pinterest are important means for placing content. The content can be in the form of words,
text, pictures or videos and is produced by consumers from around the world (Berthon et al.,
2012).
2.3. Online brand communities
Pöyry, Parvinen and Malmivaara (2013) argue that the Internet enables easy information
exchange and communication without any limitation of time or place. The missing limits
differentiate the traditional geographically bounded community from the online community.
Online communities are usually based on voluntary activity of their members and are
established around shared interests. There are many types of online communities. For
instance Kozinets (1999) describes communities of consumption as affiliated groups whose
online interactions are on the basis of shared enthusiasm for and knowledge of particular
consumption activity or associated group of activities. Pöyry, Parvinen and Malmivaara (2013)
16
outline that brand communities have similar character and have also connection to
consumption However, the centre of attention is not dedicated to consumption, but shared
interest in and admiration of a specific brand. Habibi, Laroche and Richard (2014) add that
brand community is a place (physical or virtual) for people who adore a certain brand. It is a
specialized, non-geographically bound community, which is established on a structured group
of social relations among lovers of a brand.
2.4. Consumer motives to engage on social media with fashion brands
The theory of planned behaviour have been already used for understanding the consumer
acceptance and usage of different technologies. This theory proposes that three elements
influence a person’s intention to perform behaviour such as the personal factors (attitudes),
the subjective norms (social influence) and PBC (volitional control). The personal factors
toward brand page are internal motives. A person decides to do something after positive or
negative evaluations. After that act he or she decides to become a fan of the brand page. On
the other hand, the subjective norms are defined by normative beliefs that one thinks someone
else wants him/her to do something. These social factors are related to peer influence on
joining a brand page. The control factors can be either internal or external or both (Muk, Chung
and Kim, 2014). Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite (2012) argue for a very similar concept: a
consumer starts to engage with a brand when she is provoked in a creative way by a brand or
when he or she is boosted by other consumers or when he or she feels the getting of some
benefits.
Pöyry, Parvinen and Malmivaara (2013) examines motivation for using company community
page from a different point of view. The study examines two general dimensions of the
motivation for using brand community pages: hedonic and utilitarian. . The users with utilitarian
motivation want to reach a certain goal through the community, such as finding helpful
information before making a purchase decision, whereas hedonic motivations is related to
seeking for fun and entertainment. The utilitarian motivation is connected with receiving useful
information about the item of interest and helping to make decision related to consumption. On
the other hand, hedonic motivation is linked with searching how to spend free time.
Based on Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite (2012) consumers start to engage with the brands
the most because of gained social benefits. Consumers are motivated to get involved with
online communities by their desire to know more about a brand or a particular product, as well
as toobtain help, to be a part of the community, or to get a chance to express their emotions
17
and present themselves. Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite (2012) also mention that consumers
can engage with a brand through their inner motivation to get attention and interact with
community members. Hennig-Thurau et al. (2004) summarizes eight specific factors that
motivate consumers to engage with online communities: (1) ventilating negative feelings, (2)
concern for other consumers, (3) self-enhancement, (4) advice-seeking, (5) social benefits, (6)
economic benefits (cost savings), (7) platform assistance and (8) helping the company. The
study informs that from the consumer´s point of view, the prospect of social benefits has the
greatest influence of all factors.
Krishnamurthy and Dou (2008) classify users’ motives of engagement with consumer
generated media into two extensive categories: rational (information transaction) and
emotional (relationship, fantasy). Based on their general explanation of the notion, we can
categorize the reasons behind participation with brands on social media as follows: rational
motivations might comprise a need to share knowledge with other member of brand community
and advocating a particular attitude toward a brand (advocacy); emotional motivations may
include building social connection with a brand or with other community members (social
connections) or a need for self- expression (entertainment). Fosdick (2012) also investigates
consumers’ motivations for joining brand communities. The study identified nine motivational
factors: (1) “to support a cause I like”, (2) “to share my appreciation with others”, (3) “to
associate with something I think is cool”, (4) “to learn more about it”, (5) “to feel part of like-
minded community, (6) “to get free content”, (7) “to fill time/have fun”, (8) “because it was
recommended to me”, (9) “to get advance news of products”. The study revealed that the
reason of being part of a movement and the opportunity to have news as first person are the
main motivators for consumers to follow a brand community on social media.
The study conducted by Baird and Parasnis (2011) discovers that there is a gap between what
companies think consumers are interested in and what consumers want from their social media
interactions in reality. Consumers spend their time, provide personal information about
themselves and they can even support the brand. Therefore, they are expecting something
tangible in return for that. The study reveals that most consumers interact with companies
through social media when they want to get a discount or to purchase products. Reading
reviews and product rankings was mentioned on the third place. To gain general and exclusive
information was also a motivation mentioned among other reasons behind interaction with a
brand through social media. The sixth place was occupied by the desire to learn about new
products.
18
2.5. Online community usage behaviour
Pöyry, Parvinen and Malmivaara (2013) outline two major types of community membership
dependant on members’ behaviour. The first type is called “quiet membership” and is
characterized by members who regularly read others’ posts but seldom post their own
opinions, while “communicative membership” includes those, who interact with the community
and their approach is more active. The study also describes how online communities operate
through the production and consumption of content by their members. The members consume
the content produced by others and therefore they acquire and transfer informational and social
value. The members consume the content through reading posts, watching videos or viewing
pictures posted by others. They are representatives of non-interactive community behaviour,
whereas producing content falls into the category of interactive community usage behaviour.
The content created by users is an important part of the social media phenomenon. The
members can contribute to the community by creating content, for instance posting comments
on others’ posts, posting questions related to the community theme as well as by sharing
product reviews and experiences.
Shao (2009) broadens ways in which consumers deal with CGM (consumer generated media).
The first way is consuming that refers to the consumers who read, watch, but never participate.
Participating comprises user-to-user interaction as well as user-to-content interaction, for
instance sharing with others, posting comments etc. Producing includes formation and
publication of own personal contents such as text, images, audio and video. Furthermore, Shao
(2009) supposes that different uses are caused by different consumers’ motivations therefore
he categorizes consumers in three groups according to their behaviour. First, people consume
the content for information and entertainment, i.e. they primarily read the content posted by
other consumers. Second, they participate for social interaction and community development,
therefore they often comment others’ content. Finally, they are producers of their own content
for self-expression and self-actualization. Even though Shao (2009) describes these activities
separately, he argues that there is significant interdependence among them -it means that
users are frequently part of more categories at the same time. Heinonen (2011) confirms that
consumer activities as consumption, participation and production are not connected to just one
motivation, but they are a combination of a group of motivations. Moreover, Heinonen (2011)
argues that the perception of individuals as mere consumers is not valid, since consumers can
now create business value as active producers, due to user generated content that is
decreasing the influence of traditional marketing tactics. However, Shao (2009) outlines that
in reality consumers are not very active online. They prefer to consume rather than to
participate or produce.
19
Figure 3 : Interdependence of people's consuming, participating, and producing on user-generated media (Shao, 2009)
2.6. Community engagement on social media
Thanks to the fast development of Internet and social media channels, consumer engagement
has come to be an important topic. Social media brought the opportunity to reach consumers,
to make the companies more visible, and to communicate with consumers though different
interaction than previously. Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite (2012) quoted according to Beuker
and Abbing (2010) noticed that the companies do not dedicate enough attention to online
interaction with consumers, although particularly online interaction with consumers can
increase the position of the brand on the market. Erin Wallace, Marketing & Communications
Manager for Crossroads reveals that they were always looking for fun, genuine ways to engage
with their customers, therefore social media was an obvious choice for them and they are now
really happy that their community shares its opinion with them, because they have up-to-date
invaluable feedback (Finding Success with Social Media, 2010). Hollebeck (2011) defines
engagement process as the interaction between a specific subject, which is being engaged
(consumer) and the engaging object (brand/ product or organization). Therefore, engagement
can be studied from the perspective of a consumer, and a company or a brand. Consumer
engagement is based on the will of each individual consumer.
Community engagement is greatly related to social media. Engagement could be defined as
Holy Grail of social media, because all brands, fan pages and companies’ pages try to get a
bigger share of customers’ attention and engagement in their pages. Brands are aware that
not all the people, who like their page or become a part of their brand community, will have an
impact on the brand´s community. Brands know that not all members are identical; they differ
20
regarding their engagement with the brand community, and their motivations to be a fan. This,
in consequence, influences their attitudes to the brand or company (Habibi, Laroche and
Richard 2014). Habibi, Laroche and Richard (2014) quoted according Algesheimer et al.
(2005) define community engagement as the consumer’s intrinsic motivations to communicate
and collaborate with community members.
Thanks to social networking sites marketers can create brand (fan) pages and thus give
consumers an opportunity to interact and communicate with brand followers. Brand pages are
a type of brand community formed by advertisers. Companies published brand posts on their
pages and they are expecting that this content will be shared and consumed by their fans (Muk,
Chung and Kim, 2014). Consumers can interact with different types of brand posts such as
videos, brand messages or other advertising material like coupons. The online interaction
includes activities such as sharing pictures and videos or liking and commenting on the
community page.
The NYTimes Insights Group (Brett, 2014) defines the key factors that influence people to
share the content. The study found that sharing is about relationships and they set up four key
people’s motivations to share:
To bring valuable and entertaining content to others – most of respondents in this study
answered that they are thinking how the information that they share will be helpful to
others.
To define ourselves to others – respondents said that they share the content in order
to give people a better understanding of who they are and what they are interested in
and what they care about.
To grow and nourish relationships – thanks to sharing people can stay connected to
people they might not otherwise stay in touch with.
To get the word out about causes and brands I care about – another reason of sharing
that was mentioned by respondents was related to support of specific causes or issues
that respondents care about.
Mia Freedman, publisher of leading website Mamamia summarizes the factors that influence
people to engage with online content (Venus, 2013):
It is funny – People like to laugh. Entertaining content could be the reason for sharing.
It is helpful – In general people adore to help each other. People love to lend a helping
hand for example with sale leaflet or fundraising post.
21
It made me feel something – It does not matter if it is sadness, happiness or irritation.
The content that encourages any kind of feeling is likely to be passed on.
This is what I think – People like to share content that shows what they think and
demonstrates their view of the world.
I knew it first. – Being the first to post something claims a sense of status.
The reason why community engagement became very important for the companies is
mentioned in the study by Hanna, Rohm and Crittenden (2011). They argue that Internet-based
media broadened marketing’s ability from enabling consumer’s awareness to engagement,
consideration, loyalty and advocacy. Habibi, Laroche and Richard (2014) confirm that
consumers with higher levels of engagement in brand community create stronger relationships
with the brand community aspect. They add that customer-brand relationship contributes to
the brand trust, however, it does not apply for all members of a brand page. Some people are
following the brand social media profiles, but they do not consider themselves a part of the
community. That is why engagement is so significant on social media and all representatives
of brands should pay attention to consumers’ engagement with their brands.
2.7. Brand trust and brand loyalty
Sashi (2012) implies that the interactivity of social media facilitates the establishing of abiding
relationships between consumers and brands. Furthermore, according to him the interactivity
brings the opportunity to maintain the conversation among the brand and consumers, who
become involved in production of their own content. Gummerus et al. (2012) confirms that
brand communities bring opportunity to companies and customers to engage with each other.
While firms target at engaging with loyal customers, affecting members’ perceptions about the
brand, spreading awareness about the brand and learning from and about customers,
customers receive benefits through the variety of practices that they carry out online. Brodie
et al. (2013) propose several consequences that can emerge from consumer engagement
such as trust, satisfaction, commitment, emotional connection and loyalty. The study
emphasizes that online brand community is mainly related to loyalty, commitment and
empowerment. Gummerus et al. (2012) regard loyalty as central reason for brand community
cooperation. He adds that consumers are willing to join brand community because they like
the brand and therefore they feel loyalty to it. Thanks to customer engagement loyalty can
become more forceful. It was proved that as long as fans and followers are more loyal, they
usually buy products of the brand that they follow and furthermore they are willing to
recommend it to others. The interesting fact is that they are not influencing people to start
22
following brands on social media, they are telling to buy the product, which is in the end what
the brands prefer (Digital Firefly Marketing, 2014).
Laroche, Habibi and Richard (2013) quoted according Chaudhuri and Holbrook (2001) delimit
brand trust as “the willingness of the average customer to believe in the ability of the brand to
carry out its stated function.” Trust in the brand and then loyalty to it are important for purchase
intention. Kim and Ko (2012) define purchase intention as a mixture of consumers’ interest in
and likelihood of buying a product. The purchase intention is closely related to consumer’s
attitude and preferences toward a brand. Muk, Chung and Kim (2014) quoted according to
Zeithaml (1988) add that purchase intention is the probability of consumers’ willingness to
make a purchase of a product. Corcoran (2014) mentions that there is a relationship between
revenue and social media only when the company has an engaged group of fans, who are
regularly talking to each other. Therefore, in case that the relationship grows into faithfulness
and loyalty to the brand and it might have an impact on revenue and sales.
Although, selling and buying products is the core of every businesses. Kim and Ko (2012) point
out that the value a company acquire from customers is not just limited by the income from
each transaction but that the total profit includes the customer´s activity he can provide over
the period of his relationship with the company. Therefore, customers can be evaluated as
intangible assets of the company, which should be given equal care as other financial assets.
2.8. Summary of this chapter
All of brands that operate on social media want to get fans. Consumers have different motives
to become fans of a brand page. They want to find useful information related to a product or a
brand, therefore their motives are so-called utilitarian or they want to spend their time and have
a fun, then their motives have hedonic nature. Consumers’ motives can be also divided into
internal and external. The former refers to positive or negative evaluations of the possibility to
be a brand page’s fan, in case of the latter there is peer influence and one thinks that someone
else wants him/her to become a follower of a brand on social media. These motives can be
isolated or interconnected. However, acquiring fans is not enough. Brands need fans that are
active and engage with them. Brands are creating certain image by sending a general message
about the company. This message can be transmitted in the form of text, video, competitions,
pictures etc. Fans are reading the posts, responding to each other’s comments, watching
videos or participating in competitions. However, brands need mainly fans that are active and
23
produce their own content. When a fan puts his or her comment on the brand profile, we can
talk about consumer engagement. Consumer engagement is related to the willingness to share
content. Consumers’ motivations for sharing content vary. First of all, the consumers find their
satisfaction when they bring valuable information to others. The second motive consists of
sharing something that is considered interesting by consumer of her peers and therefore by
sharing such content she can define herself to others. The next two motives are closely
connected, the consumers like to share valuable information, but they enjoy this fact more if
they get credit for that and therefore they feel valuable in the eyes of others. The last reason
for sharing the content is to support causes consumers care about. It means that they are
spreading the word about brands they believe in and thus they believe to be the part of the
brand. Brands are striving to reach higher engagement, because the stronger the relationship
with their consumers is, the more trust and loyalty in the brand are growing and consequently
they decisively influence customers’ purchase intention.
On the basis of the analysis of the scholarly literature concerning this field of study, the
conceptual model of the process of consumer engagement in social media has been
developed by the author of this thesis.
Figure 4: Conceptual model of the process of consumer engagement
24
3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This chapter discusses the research methods chosen in this study. We are justifying the choice
of research strategy and we are discussing its validity and reliability. This chapter also outlines
the way of collecting data and their analysing.
3.1. Research strategy
The subject of the research is (1) the examination of consumers’ motivations to follow fashion
brands on social media and (2) their following online engagement with these brands. The
nature of the research questions limited our target group. It was necessary to find people who
are using social media not only for personal communication, but also in order to be able to be
in contact with their favourite brands, especially fashion brands. The chosen quantitative
research strategy enabled us to gain bigger amount of respondents compared to qualitative
research strategy, and we believe that it is better to explore this particular phenomena through
larger amount of respondents. Furthermore, quantitative research creates hard data that are
open to an unambiguous explanation. The other reason for not using qualitative research
strategy was its subjectivity and the fact that the quality of the findings is often dependent upon
the skills of the interviewer, who can influence respondents and therefore endangers objectivity
of the research. Furthermore, quantitative research tries to generalize and the generalization
leads not only to understanding as in qualitative research, but also to prediction and
explanation, which was important for our study (Icoe.org, 2014).
Quantitative research is usually associated with deductive approach, therefore the author used
this approach in this study. A deductive approach means that research questions are based
on theory and then the data are collected through responses (Bryman, 2012).
25
3.2. Data collection
In order to answer the research questions and gather the data required for this thesis the
author worked with a survey in the form of an online self-completion questionnaire. A survey
in this form was chosen because that technique allows collecting data from a relatively large
number of people that represent wider international population. Therefore, it is easier to
generate findings since the gathered data is more generable (Rowley, 2014). Moreover, an
online self-completion questionnaire enabled us to reach respondents in more effective and
efficient way than other methods. The data are collected quickly and easily, and it is also
very simple to administer them (Blaxter, Hughes and Tight, 2010).Other reasons for choosing
this method are the relatively low costs and a less time-consuming research approach
compared to others (Blaxter, Hughes and Tight, 2010).
In addition, the interviewer is not present during filling the survey by respondents, thus the
interviewer´s bias is eliminated, because he or she cannot ask the question in a different
order or in different ways (Bryman, 2012). Furthermore, respondents do not have to be in a
hurry with filling a questionnaire, they can go through it with the speed that is comfortable for
them and they can complete it when they want, therefore self- completion questionnaire are
more convenient for respondents than other forms of research (Bryman, 2012).
Despite numerous advantages the researcher was aware of difficulties connected with self-
completion questionnaire. For example, there is no one that could eventually help
respondents with further explanation of an unclear question (Bryman, 2012). Therefore, the
writer dedicated great attention to ensure that questions are as clear as possible and that the
questionnaire is easy to complete. Another pitfall was the language of the survey. Since the
questionnaire was written in English, the non-native English speakers with restricted
knowledge of English could have difficulties to answer the questions perfectly. The author
run the risk that those respondents might even leave the questionnaire unfinished. That
would of course influence the validity of gained information. The author tried to avoid these
complications with establishing the pilot study to ensure that the whole survey operated well.
In case that the questions seemed not to be clear, they were replaced or described in greater
detail (Bryman, 2012).
3.3. Questionnaire development
The questionnaire was designed on the basis of literature review and other relevant findings
(Zemni, 2012) that were related to the main purpose of our survey. The questionnaire
26
included different types of questions that were grouped together in order to ensure easier
flow through survey.
First section: Social media usage
The first question of the survey was established as a filter question, because it was crucial to
sort the respondents out to followers and non-followers. On the basis of this question the
consumers, who do not follow brands were eliminated. Following respondents were then
asked two questions about their willingness or reluctance to be a fan of brands on social
media.
This section explored if respondents use social media for following brands in general.
According to the limitation established in theoretical framework, later questions tried to find
whether the respondents primarily follow fashion brands. Further questions in this part
examined the types and the number of fashion companies that people follow and the
frequency of consumer’s visits on companies’ social media profiles.
Second section: Consumers’ motives to start engaging with fashion companies on social
media. This section of the survey gave respondents the opportunity to express their views and
perceptions of the following aspects:
Consumers’ motivations to start following fashion brands on social media. The list of
possible answers was based on previous research conducted by Baird and Parasnis
(2011). Therefore, this question permits to find out if the results will be similar or the
same as in the original survey.
Activities that people are willing to do on social media fan page.
Reasons to share content published by companies on their social media profiles.
The first question was established as a filter question, because it was necessary for further
analysis to have only respondents that share fashion brands content on social media. It means
that in case the respondents did not share content published by the company they were
eliminated from this section and redirected to personal questions about them. The following
question in this section was formed on the study that was conducted by The NYTimes Insights
Group (Brett, 2014). On the basis of that study, we have set up a number of similar statements,
which respondents had to evaluate with an offered scale from 1 to 5 (1= strongly agree, 2
=agree, 3= · neither agree nor disagree, 4= disagree, 5= strongly disagree).
Third section: Personal statistics
27
This part is about collecting demographics data from respondents. The questions examine:
gender, age, level of education and the current employment situation.
The creation of a good questionnaire that would collect the data relevant for our research was
not easy and required a lot of effort in order to attract sufficient response rate (Rowley, 2014).
The self-completion questionnaire contained thirty-six open and closed questions. The open
questions enabled the author to gain further explanation or broader thoughts from respondents
(Bryman, 2012). Accordingly, the writer used the open questions in the part of the survey where
it was crucial that the respondents are able to answer in their own terms, or where the author
was not able to make an exhaustive list of all possibilities in the process of questionnaire
composition. However, the open questions required greater efforts from respondents and the
writer wanted to avoid the low response rates, therefore only two open questions were
generated and the rest of our survey was based on closed questions since they are easier to
complete for respondents. Furthermore, these types of questions are simpler for coding and
comparing single answers to each other (Bryman, 2012); a fact which we appreciated greatly
during the completion of our research.
3.4. Sampling
In order to answer the research questions, the author created a self-completion online
questionnaire that was published in different network communities on Facebook. The writer
focused especially on Facebook fan pages of fashion brands and companies, because the
field of the study is related to social media and the main purpose is to investigate the
consumers’ motivations that trigger consumer to follow and afterwards engage with fashion
brands on social media. Therefore it was only logical to use the Internet, and especially
Facebook, which is nowadays considered a very powerful social media. Moreover, it is very
simple (and free of charge) to contact and share a link to the questionnaire with friends,
different groups, companies etc. The request for filling in the questionnaire always occurred
on the basis of voluntary participation. The advantage of using social media was that the author
obtained the data directly from social media users, who were the target group of our study.
Considering that the study was not limited to any special country or population, the author
could spread questionnaire everywhere on social media. The survey was established in
English, therefore everybody who understands the language could answer it. Using online
survey and the fact that the main source of respondents was from social network
Facebook.com, where representatives of younger category are mainly registered, could cause
the small amount of representatives of older category.
28
The questionnaire was formed and the data was analysed through online self-completion
software: vyplnto.cz. This software was used, because it enabled select the right target group
for the study and to eliminate others. The questionnaire was mainly posted on Facebook;
therefore it was accessible to everyone, especially to the target population of the research -
people who use social media to follow fashion brands and not just for personal communication.
Regarding the sample size of the research, it was supposed to overcome one hundred
respondents in order to reach sample size that provides suitable data for further analysis. At
the end, the total number of respondents reached 152. After first question, which was
established as a filter question, the number of respondents decreased to 114, because it
eliminated those who are not following brands on social media.
Among the sampling methods used in this study are purposive sampling, convenience
sampling and snowball sampling.
Purposive sampling: the researcher does not search for research participants on a random
basis. The aim of purposive sampling is to choose participants in a strategic way so that those
sampled are relevant to the research questions (Bryman, 2012). The author chose participants
that were considered the best for answering the research questions by manually picking out
relevant Facebook profiles. The authors sent the questionnaire out to several fashion bloggers
with a wish of publishing it on their blogs.
Convenience sampling: the method of choosing data by selecting people on the basis of their
volunteering or because of their availability and accessibility (Bryman, 2012). The convenience
sampling was used for this research in order to reach certain number of respondents as well
as the target group. The questionnaire was placed on many fan pages, where people spend
their free time, therefore they have time to fill in the questionnaire.
Snowball sampling: the approach when the researcher has initial contact with a small group of
people who are applicable to the research theme and then he or she gets additional subjects
using the contacts of the first group (Bryman, 2012). The researcher was primarily in contact
with respondents on their personal Facebook walls. The character of Facebook enabled them
to use snowball sampling, because these respondents could share the questionnaire with
others. Therefore, this method was ideal to reach even more respondents.
29
3.5. Validity
The term measurement validity outlines how well do the measuring instruments measure what
it is supposed to be measured (Bryman, 2012). Our study focuses on the reasons why are
people becoming the brand´s followers on social media and why are they involved with these
brands. Therefore, we were asking questions about their motivations and we examined in
which activities are they engaged the most. This helped us to answer research questions
concerning consumers´ motivations for engagement with fashion brands on social media. The
validity of our study could have been negatively influenced by an unsufficient examination of
previous studies. To avoid this problem the researchers applied questions or statements used
in previous research that pursued the similar subject as our study.
External validity was taken into consideration during this study as well. External validity relates
to the issue of generalization of the results beyond the specific research context (Bryman,
2012). The research measures consumers’ motivations to follow fashion brands on social
media. The sample is formed by men and women, however, men represented 30 from the total
of 152 respondents. Therefore, the results should be viewed as an outcome of a certain sample
group, and not as representative of the whole population.
3.6. Reliability
Reliability is the consistency of a measurement of certain concept (Bryman, 2012). In brief, it
is the repeatability of the study. In case that a measurement of the same study given is similar,
we can state that this measurement is reliable. The lack of time did not made it possible for us
to conduct our study one more time; therefore it is difficult to give any conclusions about
reliability of this study. Furthermore, in case that our study would be conducted again, there is
a risk that the results would not be the same, because of the permanent change that to some
extent characterizes both the fashion industry, and the social media environment. Because of
that, the views of respondents would very likely not be the same in the future, although it would
probably be possible to observe some long-term trends. The researchers of this study tried to
avoid low reliability through well-prepared questionnaire and through a thoroughly researched
theoretical framework. Saunder et al. (2009) outlines that reliability refers to the extent to which
the data collection method and analysis procedure will yield consistent analysis. Therefore, the
sample size of respondents was closed after collecting as many completed answers as
possible. At the end, 152 questionnaires were completed, which is a good number of answers
necessary to generate consistent and adequate findings.
30
3.7. Summary of this chapter
In this chapter, the author described the scientific approach and the choices of research
methods applied in order to examine the main topic of our study. The chapter also discussed
the validity as well as reliability of the thesis. The main purpose of this chapter was to provide
the reader with all information on the process of gathering the data needed for this thesis.
31
4. Empirical results
The previous chapter is describing the way of data collecting. In this chapter the findings are
presented and discussed
4.1. Respondents’ characteristics
Overall 152 respondents answered the questionnaire. After closing the survey every
questionnaire was checked to verify that it meets the assigned criteria for this thesis. When the
response was evaluated as valid, the author could continue with analysing gained results.
Count
What is your age? Total
15-24 25-34 35-44 45-54 55+
What is your gender?
Female 69 50 2 0 1 122
Male 12 15 2 1 0 30
Total 81 65 4 1 1 152
Figure 5: Cross tabulation of gender and age
The 152 respondents were both men and women, however, most of respondents (122) were
female and the survey was completed by only 30 men. Respondents´ age structure is shown
in the previous table. The most respondents are younger women in the age range 15-24, and
in total the survey is created largely by representatives of younger generation. Other age
groups are represented in very small numbers.
32
Count
What is the highest degree or level of school you have completed? Total
Bachelor’s/
Master’s
degree
Completed
secondary
education
Doctorate
degree
Other answer Primary/
elementary
school
Uncompleted
secondary
education
What is your gender?
Female 83 31 1 2 1 4 122
Male 23 5 1 0 0 1 30
Total 106 36 2 2 1 5 152
Figure 6: Cross tabulation of gender and highest degree or level school
The following table demonstrates that respondents are mainly people with higher education,
since 106 respondents out of 152 are having bachelor´s or master´s degree. The second
largest group are people with completed secondary education. Another answers appeared in
very small quantity.
Count
Employment Status: Are you currently…? Total
A
student
Employed
full time
Employed
part time
Other
answer
Retired Self-
employed
Stay-at-
home
/Parent
Unemploye
d
What is your
gender?
Female 82 16 12 3 1 6 1 1 122
Male 18 7 3 0 0 1 1 0 30
Total 100 23 15 3 1 7 2 1 152
Figure 7: Cross tabulation of gender and employment status
Given that our respondents are mostly representatives of younger generation, it is not
surprising that 100 respondents out of 152 are students. The other two bigger groups of
respondents were formed by full time and part time employees. The rest of respondents are
divided into very small groups as far as their occupation is concerned.
33
4.2. Social media demographics related to fashion brands
How many times per week do you visit pages of fashion companies you follow on social media? (Please
tick whichever category comes closest to the number of times you visit the companies’ pages on social
media)
Total
At all At least once a
day
I do not know/ I
am not sure
Multiple times
a day
Not even once
a week
Once a week
What is your gender?
Female 28 22 7 5 28 32 122
Male 10 4 1 2 4 9 30
Total 38 26 8 7 32 41 152
Figure 8: Crosstabulation of visits of fashion companies online and gender
The respondents of the survey do not visit fashion brand pages so much. The results show
that most respondents visit the brand pages once a week or not even once a week. Those who
are really active and watch pages of particular fashion brands multiple times a day are the
smallest number of all. The recommendation for the fashion brands social media specialists
resulting from this analysis is the following: In case that people come to check the news on
the fashion brand´s social media profile, it is necessary to engage with them right away,
because otherwise they can come again in a week at the best.
Which of following social media platforms do
you use for following companies? Choose at
least one possibility, the number of answers
is unlimited. - Facebook
Total
No Facebook Facebook
What is your gender?
Female 25 97 122
Male 8 22 30
Total 33 119 152
Figure 9: Cross tabulation of gender and social media platforms
Most of respondents follow brands on Facebook, only 33 of 152 respondents stated that they
do not follow brands on Facebook. Therefore, Facebook can be perceived as the most suitable
social media platform for reaching consumers.
34
4.3. Research question 1
Which are the key motives that encourage people to engage with fashion brands on
social media?
Open question
In order to identify new patterns or motives that encourage people to engage with fashion
brands on Social media, the first survey question that was addressed this research topic was
established as an open question. Afterwards, the responses were analysed and gathered in
groups according to their type. It was possible to sort out most of the respondents’ statements
into nine groups based on motivational factors from the aforementioned Fosdick study (2012),
presented in the theoretical framework chapter of this thesis. The study classified nine
motivational factors: (1) “to support a cause I like”, (2) “to share my appreciation with others”,
(3) “to associate with something I think is cool”, (4) “to learn more about it”, (5) “to feel part of
like-minded community, (6) “to get free content”, (7) “to fill time/have fun”, (8) “because it was
recommended to me”, (9) “to get news on products in advance”.
“To learn more about it”
“Good opportunity to get more information about the company and to get to know their social
behaviour and the way that they are posting the information - if it is formal or relaxed and if the
page is chaotic or well-organized. All of this information gives me an idea about the company
and how its store would look like.” (Female, 15-24, a student)
“To support a cause I like”
“I like what they are selling. It is a source of inspiration.” (Female, 15-24, a student)
“I like their style but also their philosophies. I only follow the companies which I agree with in
what they are doing.” (Male, 15-24, a student)
“To feel part of like-minded community”
“I just want to get news from fashion industry. “ (Female, 25-34, employed part time)
“Mainly I just want to know what is going on within fashion industry since it's (related to) my
field of studies.” (Female, 25-34, a student)
35
“To get free content”
“It's easier to stay updated. Since I check my social media multiple times a day, I get informed
about the brands that interest me without having to go to their web page or to buy a
magazine.”(Female, 15-24, a student)
“To fill time/have fun”
“You often find great pictures which will inspire you or get up-to-date about the latest trends,
fashion technology, art. I often use pictures of fashion brands which were posted on their social
media profiles for instance to make a collage. But sometimes it´s really stressful to get so much
input and it takes a lot of time to read the fashion pages and search for more and more”.
(Female, 15-24, a student)
“It is inspiration for me. I like nice pictures or photo-shoots.” (Female, 15-24, a student)
“To associate with something I think is cool”
“Some of them are independent designers that post interesting inspirational pictures or
information about their products and their design. They also host events and it is a useful way
to keep up”. (Female, 15-24, a student)
“I like small indie brands so the only way to follow them is on social media.” (Male, 15-24, a
student)
“Because it was recommended to me”
“I know the owner of the brand.” (Female, 25-34, a student)
“To get news on products in advance”
I want to know what they are doing and what new products they have. (Female, 25-34, a
student)
According to Fosdick study (2012) the only statement that did not appear among the
respondents’ answers was a need to share appreciation with others. The single responses
were analysed and afterwards gathered into groups. The following graph shows that people
are encouraged to start following fashion brands on social media by the need or desire to know
more about the brand´s products, collections and so on. Therefore, the results are identical
with the results of the Fosdick study (2012), which found that people want to be a part of
movement and have a front seat for news and these facts belong to key motivators for
consumers in order to become a follower of the brand on social media.
36
Figure 10: Reasons for following social media
Closed question
Hedonic and utilitarian model
According to Pöyry, Parvinen and Malmivaara (2013) there is a hedonic and an utilitarian
model of motivations for using brand community pages. The following graph shows that
respondents´ motivations had primarily utilitarian character; because most respondents
answered that they are using fashion brands´ social media profiles to know about products and
trends. That information is considered useful in helping them to make a purchase decision. On
the other hand, respondents seemed not to be motivated by hedonic motives related to
searching for fun and entertainment.
Internal and external motives
The theoretical framework shows different point of view on reasons encouraging people to
become a member or a follower of brand page. According to the following graph, we can state
that people decide to start following fashion brand on the basis of their feeling, because most
respondents (65,79%) answered that they became a fan after own experience with the brand
(usually by using its products). The external motive related to a recommendation from a friend
placed at the second place, however, the number of respondents that chose this possibility
was just 34, 21%.
37
Figure 11: Motives to be a follower of fashion brands
The last question that was trying to decipher consumers´ motives to start following a brand on
social media was a question where respondents had to rank number of motives identified in
the previous research conducted by Baird and Parasnis (2011). The scale was chosen from 1
to 6. The highest preference was ranked with “1”, whereas the lowest with “6”. The question
consisted of the most frequent answers from the aforementioned study. Respondents could
choose from these statements: (1) “To get discounts or coupons or free products”, (2)
”Purchasing products / Current customer”, (3) “To read reviews and product rankings”, (4) “To
get general information”, (5) “To get exclusive information” and (6) “To learn about new
products”.
38
Figure 12: Comparison of motives to follow fashion brands online
The motivation of getting discount or coupons was inconsistent. People either chose the
highest preference, or the lowest one. This motivation is obviously very important for certain
people, and very minor to others. The table shows clearly that the most important reason to
start following a brand on social media networks is to learn about the brand´s new products.
Furthermore, respondents chose this reply the least as the motive with lowest preference. In
general, motives related to gaining information were placed at high positions. The table
confirms the results that were previously mentioned (in the part of hedonic and utilitarian
motives). Generally, respondents´ motivations to start to follow a fashion brand on social media
are connected more to information collection than to a need to “kill” free time or to find
entertainment.
4.4. Research question 2
In what types of activities do consumers interact with fashion brands on social media?
Are those activities concerning a particular fashion brand related to willingness to buy
a product?
To getdiscount
s orcouponsor free
products
Purchasing
products/ Currentcustome
r
To readreviews
andproductrankings
To getgeneral
information
To readreviews
andproductrankings
To learnaboutnew
products
1 - highest preference 28 12 7 21 15 31
2 19 17 17 15 23 23
3 7 15 22 19 24 27
4 9 14 28 26 20 17
5 19 36 20 19 15 5
6 - lowest preference 32 19 20 14 17 11
28
127
21
15
31
19 17 17 15
23 23
715
2219
2427
914
28 26
201719
36
20 1915
5
32
19 20
1417
11
05
10152025303540
Motives in following fashion brands on social media
1 - highestpreference
2
3
4
5
6 - lowestpreference
39
Shao (2009) suggests that consumers cope with social media in three ways: by consuming,
by participating and by producing. Consumption consists of reading the content that is posted
by others. Participation happens when people are interacting with the content as well as with
other users, e.g. when people comment other consumers’ creations. Production is
characterized as posting one’s own content on the site. On the basis of this information, we
chose six activities in which consumers can interact on social media. Shao (2009) argued that
consumers are not too active and that they are consuming more compared to participating and
producing. We chose three activities related to consuming: reading posts published by the
company, reading comments from fans and watching video. The chosen participating activities
are: responding to fan comments and participating in competitions. The author has chosen
only one of the producing activities - putting a comment on the brand’s wall and she created a
table representing the above mentioned theory for a better understanding.
Activities Consuming Participating Producing
Reading posts
Responding to fan comments
Put a comment on the brand's wall
Reading comments from fans
Watching video
Participating in competitions Figure 13: Social media activities
Consuming activities
Figure 14: The comparison of consuming activities
0,00%
10,00%
20,00%
30,00%
40,00%
50,00%
60,00%
70,00%
Consuming activitiesRead posts that are publishedby the company.
Read comments from fans ofthe brand.
Watch videos.
40
The comparison of consumption activities shows that there are some differences between
individual activities. The consumers can read not only posts published by the company, but
they can read comments that were created by consumers. However, the graph shows that
people are not interested in other consumers´ comments to the same extent as in posts
published directly by the company. Therefore, we cannot confirm the conclusions of Paquette
(2013) quoted according to Cheong and Morrison’s study (2008). Their study argued that
consumers like reading other consumers’ comments in order to get information before they
buy a product. After that, their concern about purchase is decreasing. Furthermore, the study
found that consumers are more interested in product information posted by other consumers
compared to information published by the companies. Nevertheless, investigation of this thesis
cannot approve this fact, since only a very small percentage of respondents answered that
they “always or very often” read other consumers’ comments.
The last activity related to consuming behaviour on social media that was examined in our
survey is watching videos. The graph shows that people are interested more in watching video
compared to other consuming activities. This means that there is a potential for companies to
improve the brand – consumer relationship by posting more interesting videos on their social
media profiles. In case that the companies wants to intensify the salience of the brand post,
they have to incorporate vividness into their brand post characteristic. The companies can
reach vivid brand posts by implementation of dynamic animations, colours or pictures.
Furthermore, a bigger level of vividness can be achieved by stimulation of multiple senses.
Video meets those requirements: it is more vivid than a picture, because it affects not only
sight, but also hearing (De Vries, Gensler and Leeflang, 2012).
Figure 15: The comparison of consuming activities
3,51% 0,88%5,26%
12,28%4,39%
13,16%
32,46%
16,67%26,32%
49,12%58,77%
50,00%
2,63%
17,54%
5,26%0,00% 1,75% 0,00%
0,00%
10,00%
20,00%
30,00%
40,00%
50,00%
60,00%
70,00%
Read posts thatare published by
the company.
Read commentsfrom fans of the
brand.
Watch videos.
Consuming activities
Always
Very often
Often
Sometimes
Never
Not sure
41
The following table clearly represents that consumers prefer to read posts or watch videos on
social media. De Vries, Gensler and Leeflang (2012) quoted according to Choo (1999) argues
that greatly vivid brand posts are more effective in relation to intention to click and click-
through. We can confirm this claim, because a higher amount of respondents answered that
they watch videos “always and very often” compared to other two activities. The following table
was created for arrangement better understanding, so it is clearly visible that people consume
videos more frequently than they read posts published by the company or by other consumers.
Shao (2009) noticed that all three activities (consumption, participation and production) are
often mixed and people are frequently engaged in all three activities or in a combination of two.
Thus, it is not simple to separate these activities. Shao (2009) argues that they are extremely
interconnected; however, he did not examine the particular connections between the activities.
When we looked at the relationship between reading posts published by the company and
watching videos, we discovered that 75% of those who are “always” watching videos are as
well “very often” reading the company’s’ posts. The conclusion that could be drawn from this
table is that the less the consumers are reading companies’ posts, the less they are watching
videos on social media. We can support this connection of the two types of activities by the
results shown in the last column of the following table. It shows that respondents (66, 67%),
who never watch videos also seldom (33, 33%) read brand posts.
Figure 16: Interconnection of consuming activities
Participation activities
7,14% 5,56% 3,57%
75,00%
14,29% 11,11% 10,71%
25,00%
50,00%
36,11%
16,07%
28,57%44,44%
62,50%
66,67%
2,78% 7,14%
33,33%
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
100%
Always Very often Often Sometimes NeverRe
ad p
ost
s, t
hat
are
pu
blis
he
d
by
the
co
mp
any.
Watch videos.
Never
Sometimes
Often
Very often
Always
42
Shao (2009) argues that besides consumption activities, consumers might participate through
connecting with the content or with other users on social media. We focused only on examining
user-to content interaction. The first one that we investigated is comments on others creation.
We named this activity as responding to fan comments. Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite (2012)
argues that due to commenting consumers can give their opinion on different platforms, assess
brands or services. Consumers are participating actively and it is their personal wish to do that.
The study mentioned also that commenting can help companies to identify their consumers
and then reach them simpler. They can watch their attitude, opinions and then strengthen the
relationship between them and their consumers.
Figure 17: Responding to fans´ comments
Compared to consumption activities, it is very easy to see that people do not really like to
participate with other followers of the brand. The graph shows that the most frequent answer
to the question “How often do you respond to other fans’ comments?” was “never”. In previous
section we found that people are reading others´ posts, however, they rarely react to them.
This is bad news for companies, who usually need active followers who react to others’
opinions. The participation actions are more valuable for the company, because the followers’
activity in the form of comment can be seen by their friends and due to this the brand can
attract new consumers.
1,75%
72,81%
5,26%
16,67%
3,51%
0,00%
10,00%
20,00%
30,00%
40,00%
50,00%
60,00%
70,00%
80,00%
Always Never Often Sometimes Very often
Responding to fans´ comments
Total
43
Figure 18: Participating in competitions
Zailskaite-Jakste and Kuvykaite, 2012 quoted according to Ha, Yoon and Choi (2007) argue
that online quizzes and games attract consumers to spend their free time on them, give them,
satisfaction and help them to relax. Hart et al. (2008) found that people had enjoyable
experiences due to interaction with their friends through games, quizzes, and other
applications. However, our graph shows that interaction with the brands through a competition
in the form of games or quizzes is not attractive to a lot of consumers. Most of our respondents
declared that they never participate or that they participate only sometimes. Only 2, 63% of
respondents “always” participate when they find some sort of a competition put on the brand´s
social media profile.
Production activities
It has been demonstrated that consumers are in reality not so active on social media, and that
they prefer consuming rather than participating or contributing to the content (Heinonen, n.d.).
Fosdick (2012) adds that passive social media activities as reading the posts or watching
videos demand less involvement and cognitive processing than such activities as writing one´s
own comment on the brand’s wall or creating a video. Therefore, consumers are rather
involved in passive activities, because they do not demand so much conscious effort. Our
survey brought the same results. The graph clearly demonstrates that consumers are not
interested in creating their own posts and placing it on the brand’s wall. Most of the
respondents answered that they have never posted a comment on the wall of some brand.
Those who answered positively were very few.
2,63%
35,96%
0,88%
15,79%
40,35%
4,39%
0,00%
5,00%
10,00%
15,00%
20,00%
25,00%
30,00%
35,00%
40,00%
45,00%
Always Never Not sure Often Sometimes Very often
Participating in competitions
Total
44
Figure 19: Putting a comment on the brand´s wall
4.5. Research questions 3
What motivate consumers to share content of fashion brands on social media? Is
sharing content interrelated with purchase decision?
This research question was answered only by 40 respondents, who came through filter
question, which eliminated the respondents, who are not sharing the content published by the
brands.
Always OftenSometim
esNever Not sure
Total 2,63% 3,51% 26,32% 66,67% 0,88%
0,00%
10,00%
20,00%
30,00%
40,00%
50,00%
60,00%
70,00%
Putting a comment on the brand´s wall.
Total
45
Figure 20: The reasons to sharing content
On the basis of the study conducted by The NYTimes Insights Group (Brett, 2014) we created
statements that are seen in the table above. The table shows that most respondents (35%)
strongly agree with the statement „I share because I feel valuable in the eyes of others”. In
general, people have a desire to reach self-fulfilment; they want to feel more involved in this
world, which is partially offered to them by social media and especially through sharing the
content. The second statement related closely to the first one. 25% of respondents stated that
they “share to show someone else that I am thinking about them and that I care”. Furthermore,
32, 5% of the respondents share information about a brand that they believe in and 22, 5% of
respondents share in order to bring valuable and entertaining content to others. In general,
people share the brand´s content in case that they believe in it and they identify with the
particular content or with the whole brand. Sharing a helpful content enables them to show that
they care about their friends, they are thinking about them. A strong motivation for the followers
to share content is the need to feel valuable in the eyes of others, and their satisfaction when
the content that they share brings something positive to others. This satisfaction is related to
the fact that people naturally want to help out others.
I share it,because it
brings valuableand
entertainingcontent to
others.
I share todefine myself
to others.
I share to showsomeone else
that I amthinking aboutthem and that
I care.
I share to feelvaluable in theeyes of others.
I share tospread
informationabout a brand I
believe in.
Strongly disagree 15,00% 10,00% 5,00% 7,50% 15,00%
Disagree 10,00% 27,50% 20,00% 20,00% 12,50%
Neither agree nor disagree 45,00% 32,50% 22,50% 20,00% 30,00%
Agree 22,50% 7,50% 27,50% 17,50% 32,50%
Strongly agree 7,50% 22,50% 25,00% 35,00% 10,00%
7,50%22,50% 25,00%
35,00%
10,00%
22,50%7,50%
27,50%17,50%
32,50%
45,00%32,50%
22,50% 20,00%30,00%
10,00% 27,50%20,00% 20,00% 12,50%
15,00% 10,00% 5,00% 7,50% 15,00%
0,00%
20,00%
40,00%
60,00%
80,00%
100,00%
120,00%
The reasons for sharing content
Strongly agree Agree Neither agree nor disagree Disagree Strongly disagree
46
Figure 21: Motivation to share content
The theoretical framework shows the five most important reasons that influence people to
share content related to fashion industry on social media. . The graph demonstrates that the
most important reason for sharing the content is to experience or to provoke any kind of
feelings. People are mainly motivated to share content on the basis of emotions. There is also
a need to help other consumers or friends - simply whether people see something that could
be useful for others then they often share their experience and opinions to help others with
their decision. Funny content can encourage sharing as well. The reason why people share
funny content is related to the fact that people simply like to laugh and they prefer to show that
they are happy rather than sad.
47
According to De Vries, Gensler and Leeflang (2012) there are different types of posts that can
be used by companies on their brand fan page such as videos, images, texts or questions.
Brand posts can be divided into two categories: first, informative posts in case that there is
information about the company/ brand or its product. Second category would be made of
entertaining brand posts. These posts do not have to consist of information directly related to
the brand; the posts can consist of e.g. funny movies, comic stripes, or anecdotes. Those posts
can also be neutral, bringing an interesting fact or advocating for a cause not related to the
brand. Regarding the graph above, we can see that the active fans are interested in informative
posts. More than half of respondents (57, 5%) share posts that contain information about new
fashion product, brand and so on. The second place belongs again to informative posts about
special offers and promotions. Non-information posts appeared at last places.
48
5. ANALYSIS
5.1. Activities of fans
Hypothesis: Fans who behave actively on social media participate in more activities.
Explanation: We believe that consumers who are active in some way are usually active and
perform more activities regarding their favourite fashion brand. We believe that fans, who read
posts on brand page will read comments others’ fans, answer on these comments, watch
videos or participate in competitions, thus they will not do only one activity, but they will be
active in many respects. Moreover, we expect that there is a linkage between some pair of
activities and that some types of activities are linked and interconnected.
Statistical analysis: Statistical test used: Chi-square of independence in contingency table
Null hypothesis H0: Reading posts that are published by the fashion company (question 14)
does not depend on reading comments from fans of the brand. (or; similarly, all pairs among
questions 14-19)
Alternative hypothesis H1: Reading posts that are published by the fashion company
(question 14) depends on reading comments from fans of the brand. (or; similarly, all pairs
among questions 14-19)
Significance level of the test = 0.05
Calculation: Contingency table contains 2 x 2 fields, both in rows and columns the frequency
of given activity (Always + Very often + Often and Sometimes + Never + Not sure).
Critical value 2(0.95) = 3.8415
Result: Test statistics are higher than critical value for the following pair of activities: 14-16,
14-18, 15-16, 15-18, 16-17, 16-18, i.e. 6 pairs out of 15 pairs. In these cases the null hypothesis
is rejected in favour of the alternative hypothesis. In other cases, null hypothesis cannot be
rejected.
Explanation: Put a comment on the brand’s wall, Read comments from fans of the brand,
Respond to fan comments and Watch videos are inter-connected with each other, question 17
49
Put a comment on the brand’s wall is connected least with the activity 16 Respond to fan
comments. On the other hand, question 19 Participate in competitions is not linked to with any
other activity listed in the questionnaire.
Conclusion: The hypothesis “Fans who behave actively participate in more activities.” is
statistically proven.
5.2. Activity of fans versus buying the product
Hypothesis: Fans who behave actively and participate in various activities are ready to buy
product from a fashion brand.
Explanation: We believe that consumers who actively participate in at least one activity such
as reading comments and posts, responding to other fans’ comments, watching video or
participating in competition, are also active in real life, which is manifested by purchasing a
product of following a particular fashion brand.
Statistical analysis: Statistical test used: Chi-square of independence in contingency table
Null hypothesis H0: Reading posts that are published by the company (question 14; or,
similarly, questions 15-19) does not influence the decision to buy product from a fashion
brand based on an online experience (question 12)
Alternative hypothesis H1: Reading posts that are published by the company (question 14;
or, similarly, questions 15-19) depends on the decision to buy product from a fashion brand
based on an online experience (question 12)
Significance level of the test = 0.05
Calculation: Contingency table contains 2 x 2 fields, that is frequency of given activity (Always
+ Very often + Often and Sometimes + Never + Not sure) and buying product based on online
experience (Yes and No).
Test statistics for question 14: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 0.4316
Test statistics for question 15: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 2.7270
Test statistics for question 16: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 0.0014
Test statistics for question 17: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 4.2820
Test statistics for question 18: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 0.0292
Test statistics for question 19: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 0.0401
50
Critical value 2(0.95) = 3.8415
Result: In case of question 17 the test statistics exceeds the critical value, so the null
hypothesis is rejected in favour of the alternative hypothesis. In other cases, null hypothesis
cannot be rejected.
Explanation: Putting a comment on the brand’s wall is the only activity of fans that was tested
as statistically significant as dependent on the purchasing product of selected fashion brand
based on the online experience. Fans that are active are more likely to purchase the product
from followed fashion brand; fans less active or inactive are more likely not to buy the
product. Other participation activities are not proved as being dependent on the purchase
in the real life.
Conclusion: The hypothesis “Fans who behave actively and participate in various activities
are ready to buy product from a fashion brand.” was statistically proved only in the case of
putting comments on the brand’s wall.
5.3. Real life consequences of sharing content
Hypothesis: Fans who share content are ready to recommend product/ consider product
during buying process / buy the product in the future.
Explanation: We believe that consumers who share content on the company’s fan page have
more positive attitude towards the selected fashion brand, which is consequently demonstrated
by their willingness to a) recommend the brand to others, b) consider that brand if he/she is
going to buy a certain product, c) buy the product from the brand.
Statistical analysis 1: Statistical test used: Chi-square of independence in contingency table
Null hypothesis H0: Sharing content on the fans page (question 23) does not depend on the
willingness to recommend that brand to others (question 10.1; or, similarly, questions 10.2 and
10.3)
Alternative hypothesis H1: Sharing content on the fans page (question 23) depends on the
willingness to recommend that brand to others (question 10.1; or, similarly, questions 10.2 and
10.3)
51
Significance level of the test = 0.05
Calculation: Contingency table contains 2 x 2 fields, that is sharing content (Yes and No) and
willingness to recommend (Always + Usually and Sometimes + Never).
Test statistics for question 10.1: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 0.0332
Test statistics for question 10.2: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 0.2851
Test statistics for question 10.3 Chi-squared statistics 2 = 0.0397
Critical value 2(0.95) = 3.8415
Result: The test statistics does not exceed the critical value in any cases, so the null
hypothesis cannot be rejected.
Statistical analysis 2:
Statistical test used: The comparison of relative frequency of two samples.
Null hypothesis H0: 1 = 2
Alternative hypothesis H1: 1 2
Significance level of the test = 0.05
Calculation: Comparison of proportion of people who are willing to recommend the brand to
others from active fans (who share content) and from passive fans (who read and watch but
do not share)
Test statistics for question 10.1: u = 0.1822
Test statistics for question 10.2: u = 0.5340
Test statistics for question 10.3 u = 0.1991
Critical value u (0.975) = 1,9600
Result: The test statistics does not exceed the critical value in any cases, so the null
hypothesis cannot be rejected.
Explanation: Sharing content is not related with the willingness to recommend fashion brand
to others, or to consider this brand when people are going to buy product of this type, or even
52
to buy this product. We see that being active online is not connected with being active in real
life.
Conclusion: The hypothesis “Fans who share content are ready to recommend product/
consider product when go to buy/ buying the product.” was not statistically proved. The
association between online activity and real time activity was not found.
5.4. As a consequence of sharing content to be active in real life
Hypothesis: Fans who share content bought the product based on the online experience.
Explanation: We believe that active fans, who share content based on their own online
experience bought a certain product.
Statistical analysis 1: Statistical test used: Chi-square of independence in contingency table
Null hypothesis H0: Sharing content on the fans page (question 23) does not depend with the
purchasing the product (question 12)
Alternative hypothesis H1: Sharing content on the fans page (question 23) depends with the
purchasing the product (question 12)
Significance level of the test = 0.05
Calculation: Contingency table contains 2 x 2 fields, that is sharing content (Yes and No) and
purchasing the product (Yes and No).
Test statistics: Chi-squared statistics 2 = 0.6920
Critical value 2(0.95) = 3.8415
Result: The test statistics does not exceed the critical value, so the null hypothesis cannot be
rejected.
Statistical analysis 2:
Statistical test used: Comparison of relative frequency of two samples
Null hypothesis H0: 1 = 2
53
Alternative hypothesis H1: 1 2
Significance level of the test = 0.05
Calculation: The comparison of proportion of people who bought the product among active
fans (who share content) and among passive fans (who read and watch but do not share)
Test statistics: u = 0.8318
Critical value u(0.975) = 1,9600
Result: The test statistics does not exceed the critical value in any cases, so the null hypothesis
cannot be rejected.
Explanation: Sharing content does not depend with the purchasing the product based on the
online experience. We see again that being active online is not connected with being active in
real life.
Conclusion: The hypothesis “Fans who share content bought the product based on the
online experience.” was not statistically proved. The association between online activity and
real life activity was not found.
5.5. Reasons of being active online (sharing content) versus reasons for purchasing a fashion product
Hypothesis: Among active fans reasons for being active (sharing content) are connected with
the decision of purchasing fashion.
Explanation: We believe that consumers who share content on the company’s fan page are
positive towards the selected fashion brand and its purchase.
Statistical analysis 1: Statistical test used: Chi-square of independence in contingency table
Note: problematic in some combinations in contingency table because of low expected
frequency (below 5)
54
Null hypothesis H0: Reason of being active “I share it, because it brings valuable and
entertaining content to others” (question 25, similarly questions 26-29) does not depend with
the purchasing the product (question 12)
Alternative hypothesis H1: Reason of being active “I share it, because it brings valuable and
entertaining content to others” (question 25; similarly questions 26-29) depends on the
purchase of the product (question 12)
Significance level of the test = 0.05
Calculation: Contingency table contains 2 x 2 fields, first, reason of sharing content (Strongly
agree + Agree, Disagree + Strongly disagree) and second, purchasing the product (Yes and
No).
Test statistics for question 25: 2 = 0.6304
Test statistics for question 26: 2 = 2.4107
Test statistics for question 27: 2 = 1.5532
Test statistics for question 28: 2 = 0.7992
Test statistics for question 29: 2 = 1.6380
Critical value 2(0.95) = 3.8415
Result: The test statistics do not exceed the critical value, so the null hypothesis cannot be
rejected in all reasons of being active (questions 25-29).
Statistical analysis 2:
Statistical test used: Comparison of relative frequency of two samples
Null hypothesis H0: 1 = 2
Alternative hypothesis H1: 1 2
Significance level of the test = 0.05
Calculation: The comparison of proportion of people who bought the product. The first group
are active fans who share content because of a certain reason and the second group is formed
by active fans who did not select this particular reason of sharing.
55
Test statistics for question 25: u = 0.7940
Test statistics for question 26: u = 1.5562
Test statistics for question 27: u = 1.2463
Test statistics for question 28: u = 0.8940
Test statistics for question 29: u = -1.2798
Critical value u (0.975) = 1, 9600
Result: The test statistics does not exceed the critical value in any cases, so the null
hypothesis cannot be rejected.
Explanation: Reason of sharing content does not correlate with the purchase of the product
based on the online experience.
Conclusion: The hypothesis “There are reasons of being active connected with the decision
of purchasing the product based on the online experience among active fans.” was not
statistically proved. The author does not identify any reason of being active, i.e. being active
fan and share content, and purchasing the product. The association between reason of
online activity and real time activity was not found.
5.6. The difference between active and passive fans
Active fans (who share content; 40) statistically differ from passive fans (who follow fashion
brand but do not actively share content; 74) in following characteristics:
“What types of companies do you follow on social media?” (Question 5) – Active fans more
often follow INDUSTRIAL companies (12.5%) versus passive fans (4.1%).
Note: in some cases passive fans more often follow certain industries than active fans, even
though this is not statistically significant (AIRLINES, ALCOHOL, AUTOMOBILES,
ELECTRONICS, TRAVEL). It is possible to guess that these are rather male interests.
“Approximately, how many fashion companies do you follow on social media?” (Question 6) –
Active fans more often follow 5+ fashion companies on social media (67.5%) compared to
passive fans (36.5%).
56
“Putting a comment on the brand’s wall.” (Question 17) – Active fans more often put a comment
on the brand’s wall (12.5%) versus than the passive fans (2.7%).
There is no statistically significant difference in characteristics:
-gender (share of females among active fans is 82.5% and among passive fans 82.4%)
-age (share of 15-24 years old persons among active fans is 50.0% and among passive fans
58.1%)
-education (share of people with bachelor or master’s degree among active fans is 70.0% and
among passive fans 63.5%)
-employment status (share of employed full/part-time among active fans is 27.5% and among
passive fans 23.0%; share of students among active fans is 70.0% and among passive fans
63.5%)
-frequency of visiting pages of fashion brand per week (at least once a week visit pages 67.5%
of active fans and 63.5% of passive fans)
-reasons of becoming a fashion brand’s fan (question 9): share of high preference (answer
1+2+3) of the reason of becoming a fashion brand's fan among active fans and passive fans (
9.1 To get discounts or coupons or free products 40% / 51,4%, 9.2 Purchasing
products/Current customer 47.5% / 33.8%, 9.3 To read reviews and product rankings 42,5%/
39,2%, 9.4 To get general information 45% / 50%, 9.5 To get exclusive information 55% /
54,1%, 9.6 To learn about new products 70% / 71,6%)
-activities in real life (question 10): share of the “yes” answer among active and passive fans
(10.1. – recommend brand to others 30% / 28,4%; considering to buy a certain product 60% /
54, 8%; buy the product from the fashion brand 37,5% / 35,6%)
-activities on the fan’s webpage (questions 14, 15, 16, 18, 19)- the share of the “yes” answer
among active / passive fans (14. Reading posts that are published by the company 55% / 44,
6%, 15. Reading comments from fans of the brand 27, 5 % / 18, 9 %, 16. Responding to fan
comments 15% / 8, 1%, Watching videos 52, 5 % / 39, 7%, Participating in competitions 30%
/18,9%)
57
6. DISCUSSION
This chapter provides a space for reflection over our findings and examines the main research
goal stated at the beginning of the thesis. The overarching goal of the current study was to find
motives that encourage people to engage with fashion brands on social media. We also wanted
to investigate their activities with these brands and examine their intention to share content
published on a particular fashion brand page with others.
6.1. Which are the key motives that encourage people to engage with fashion brands on social media?
The results of this study offer several interesting insights into consumer behaviour on fashion
brand fan pages. The open question that was looking for an answer on this issue did not make
a new discovery. It rather confirmed the existing hypothesis that respondents are mostly
interested in gaining new information. We expected this outcome of the study, because fashion
is an industry area which is constantly changing, and being up to date on the newest trends is
a strong incentive for people to engage with brands’ social media profiles. It is important for
people interested in fashion to have all the newest information about collections, products and
materials. The respondents do not perceive their engagement with brands’ social media pages
as a leisure activity; they rather desire to receive useful information.
People usually become fans of a particular brand when they are thinking about buying its
products or after a personal experience with a product or brand. Regarding this finding, the
author stipulates that people are becoming fans or followers of a brand in case that they really
like its products or the brand as such, and they want to be part of the surrounding community.
Thus, the followers are mainly those who are already consuming and using brand´s products
or services and therefore the company can easily engage with them. The relationship with
such customers can be long and stable, and these consumers can become very loyal to that
brand under the condition of being taken good care of by the brand´s marketers, customer
services, shops etc. Nevertheless, some people become fans because they received an
invitation from friends or because they are considering buying the brand´s products in the
future. Therefore, fans are not always familiar with brand and their first contact with the brand
is crucial. The first post that they will see on the brand´s social media profile will form their
opinion of and relationship with the brand. If the first contact fails to attract their attention, it is
possible that they will not return to the brand´s page for a long time, which in turn means that
the company is losing an opportunity to gain new paying customers.
58
In accordance with the findings of the study by Baird and Parasnis (2011), we confirmed that
the motivation in the form of discounts is ambiguous. It is either one of the most important or
one of the least important motives. Apparently, there are two groups of fashion lovers, one
group adores discounts and special offers, whereas the other group is not interested in gaining
such bonuses. It again confirms our main finding, that people are mostly concerned with
learning information about new products, getting general information, or reading reviews.
6.2. In what types of activities do consumers interact with fashion brands on social media? Are those activities concerning a particular fashion brand related to willingness to buy a product?
When consumers become fans of the brand on social media, it is just a beginning of the story.
Brands need to deepen the connection between them and their customers through different
activities. The results are not surprising: respondents’ answers show that people consume the
content rather than participate or produce their own content. People like reading posts
produced by fashion brands, but according to our survey, they do not care about content
published by other consumers. This finding is in contrast with from the Cheong and Morrison’s
study (2008) study that examined the same issue. Regarding the consuming activities, people
like watching videos rather than reading posts; this result could be influenced by the young
age of our respondents. Younger people enjoy videos because they do not have to strain their
brain; they are just watching and listening. Furthermore, the popularity of video could be related
to the character of fashion that is based on the visual nature. This leads us to the persuasion
that videos should be an evident choice for fashion companies´ social media profiles. As far
as the competitions and quizzes are concerned, people do not often participate in them,
however, they are more willing to participate in a competition than to respond to fans´
comments. For the purpose of this thesis, the production activity that was examined in this
survey was reduced to putting comments on the brand wall. The results show that people do
not like producing their own content. Most respondents mentioned that they have never posted
any comment on the brand wall and those who have placed it are just a
The analysis part examined the relationship between these activities. According to Shao
(2009), there should be interdependence among them, which means that users are frequently
part of more categories at the same time. The results show that not all of the online activities
are interconnected, for instance putting a comment on the brand’s wall is co-dependent only
with responding to fans´ comments by other active fans. In case that they are willing to post
comment, they will be willing to create something of their own = post their own content. The
59
activity of participating in competitions is not connected with any other activity. It can signify
that there are people who like only competition and they participate in online activities only
when it is possible to win a prize. In general it can be stated that active fans are likely to engage
in more activities.
The theoretical framework pointed out that in reality people are not so active. To put one´s own
content on the brand´s wall requires more involvement and effort. Our analysis showed that in
case that people post their own content, they are also more willing to buy the product of a
particular fashion brand. The author suggests that these people believe in the particular brand,
therefore they are more prone to create and share their own online content on the brand´s
social media profile. Moreover, such followers are more likely to be loyal to the particular brand,
which in turn means that they are willing to buy its fashion products.
6.3. What motivate consumers to share content of fashion brands on social media? Is sharing content interrelated with purchase decision?
The results show that most consumers interact with the content that is helpful to others. They
are either sharing the information about products they care about or when they can help
someone to form his opinion of the brand, or to support him in the purchase decision. We can
state that people share online content connected to a particular fashion brand because it
makes them feel good and the content might be useful for someone else. Sharing brings a
feeling of being valuable in the eyes of others. Followers and fans incline to share informative
brand posts; posts that contain information about a brand or product. On the other hand, the
posts that are entertaining are not that interesting for them.
The analysis of the survey does not prove a relationship between sharing online content and
willingness to recommend product or even buy product from followed fashion brand in the
future. The examination of an already realized purchase and an online experience also do not
prove a relationship among them. Furthermore, the survey shows that there is not a
relationship between the reason for sharing content and the purchase decision. None of the
online activities shows strong influence on the customer’s purchase decision.
The statistics showed that active and passive fans of a fashion brand behave in the same way
when it comes to the purchase decision, and that sharing content on the brand´s social media
page is not really connected to the behaviour in real life (= in stores).
60
7. CONCLUSION
7.1. Research summary
The aim of this study has been to identify consumers’ motives that encourage them to engage
with fashion brands on social media, to find out in what types of activities do these followers
engage online, and find the reason(s) that motivate consumers to further interact with brands
and subsequently share the content published by companies. Moreover, the author strives to
find out whether there is a relationship between consumer engagement and purchase
intention.
According to the findings of our survey, the author conceptualizes the following model of
consumer engagement within fashion industry: At the beginning, there is a fashion brand that
wants to reach as much consumers as possible. Fans start to follow fashion brands on social
media on the basis of many reasons, but mostly they decide to become fans / followers of a
particular fashion brand because they need to find information about products, because they
are curious about the brand, or because they want to learn about new trends and collections.
People usually decide to follow a brand´s social media profile based on their own opinion and
their feelings. They sometimes follow their friend’s recommendation, or they react based on
an invitation from the company. The fashion brands strive to engage with them through posts
in the form of text, video or competition. All of these activities apart from participating in
competition are interrelated, therefore it is probable that people who watch video also read
posts and respond to fan comments. The strongest relationship that a fashion brand can have
with their consumers is represented by fans who are creating and posting their own content on
the brand´s social media profile. The only activity where the relationship with purchase
intention has been found is connected with putting a comment on the brand’s wall. This
interaction demands more effort from consumers and therefore the author suggests that
people who are putting content on the brand´s profile are more loyal towards that fashion brand
and their loyalty is manifested by their willingness to buy the product. Consumers’ motivation
to share content with others has roots in their feelings. The content that made them feel
something is worth sharing with others. Since some people are altruistic by nature, another
motive is linked with their need to help others. Consumers want to share their experience and
they like to feel valuable; sharing helpful content enables them to feel useful and have a voice.
In case of the funny and entertaining posts people´s reactions are generally positive and they
tend to actively participate in sharing such content.
61
Furthermore, the analysis shows that there are some differences between active and passive
fans. Firstly, passive fans more often follow some of the type of industries that seem to be
more of a male matter. Fashion industry does not appear among industries favoured by
passive fans (airlines, alcohol, automobile, electronics and travel businesses), therefore we
can stipulate that fashion fans are more active and willing to share content than fans of other
industries. This research outcome seems to be positive news for fashion industry on social
media.
Figure 22: Final conceptual model of the process of consumer engagement
7.2. Practical contributions to fashion brands
Managerially, the study deepens the understanding of different strategies related to
consumers’ activities on social media and the motivations associated with these activities. The
study offers several recommendations for marketers.
Visual content
Fashion brands should emphasize on visualizing products always when possible. The results
showed that people prefer videos or pictures before text. Moreover, interest of consumers in
information about brand, products, collections, and materials shows that the ideal post is
informative and vivid. Fashion brands have enormous advantage in the nature of their products
because they are visual objects suitable for processing in the form of picture or video. Fashion
62
brands have the advantage of being a part of a visually interesting industry, they can upload a
lot of interesting post such as pictures from back stage of a fashion show or of the fashion
designer´s work process. Our results also demonstrate that the information about brands and
products belongs to the most frequently shared content on social media, therefore publishing
interesting or useful information about your brands is also the right way how to maintain
conversation with your customers.
Figure 23: Visual content
Competition
Although respondents of our survey do not belong to lovers of competition on social media,
there were a lot of people who answered that they sometimes participate in competitions
organized by fashion brands. The author sees big potential in competitions; however, fashion
brands need to make them more appealing. Given that the main purpose of brands´ social
media profiles is greater engagement with their consumers, it is ideal to combine competition
with content produced by consumers. For instance, fashion brands can easily announce
competition based on posting pictures of consumers who are wearing their products.
Moreover, this activity is not interrelated with other activities according to results of this study.
It means that people who participate in a competition are usually not willing to participate in
other activities. Therefore, the competition might be the only activity those fans will engage in,
so it is very important that the competition is well prepared and manages to target the right
customers. They can in turn become very loyal to the company.
63
Figure 24: The post in the form of competitions
The results also showed that another activity fashion brands should engage their fans in is
asking them questions about their preferred style, about new range, about their favourite
colour, material, or pattern etc. The results of the study clearly demonstrated consumer’s
willingness to share content that is showing that they care about some issue. People like
helping each other make purchase decisions, gain bonuses, get free samples etc. Sharing
such helpful content contributes to their feeling that they are valuable in the eyes of their social
media friends. Therefore, the author believes that asking the followers for their opinion is an
ideal way how to engage them.
64
Figure 25: Using of questions
7.3. Future research
This study raises some important and interesting questions for future research. First, it
examines motives of consumers to engage with fashion brands, their activities on their brand
fan pages and how these relationships evolve. The study is using data from the fashion
industry. Moreover, this study is based on a survey completed by a relatively small group of
respondents of whom the portion of highly engaged (active) members is even smaller. Further
research could examine larger samples of consumers across different product categories to
see whether the findings can generalize to other markets. Second, the study suggests that
there is a difference between active and passive fans, so the future studies could focus on
each group separately and identify for instance the type of activities and themes that are the
most interesting for each group to help brands with better targeting their customers.
This research may have some limitations in its scope, but this can also be understood as its
contribution to this field of study, since it indicates the avenues for further research. Although,
this investigation did not primarily target young people, the major part of respondents was
formed by university students. Moreover, the data does not provide sufficient number of male
respondents, thus it was not possible to examine the difference between men and women in
detail. In future studies, different demographics can be studied to obtain a better understanding
65
of the differences in behaviour and motives for engaging with fashion brands between various
demographics groups.
The future research focused on social media within fashion industry could be dedicated to a
deeper examination of the differences among consumer behaviour on different social media
platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and other social media platforms.
The comparison of single platforms could help companies to understand their effect on
consumer behaviour. Therefore, the companies would know if it is better to use only one social
media or if it is more powerful to use a combination of several social networks at the same
time. It would also be enriching to further develop this research by conducting a qualitative
study, which would verify (or not) our conclusions.
66
8. APPENDIX
8.1. Social media usage
Figure 26: Following companies on social media
Figure 27: The type of social media platform using for following brands on social media
67
Figure 28: The reason for not using social media for following brands
68
Figure 29: The media used for searching information about brands
69
Figure 30: The number of followed companies on social media
Figure 31: The frequency of visits of followed fashion brands on social media
70
8.2. Consumers’ motives to interact with fashion companies on social media
Figure 32: The influence by online experience to buy products
Figure 33: The number of people who share content
71
Figure 34: The perception of marketing activities of fashion companies on social media
8.3. Personal statistics
Figure 35: Gender characteristic
72
Figure 36: Age characteristic
Figure 37: The education characteristic
73
8.4. Questions of the survey
1) Do you follow companies on social media?
YES
NO
2.1 - 2.9) Which of following social media platforms do you use for following companies?
Choose at least one possibility, the number of answers is unlimited.
YouTube
Myspace
Google Plus
Other: Please specify
3) Why do you not use social media for following companies?
4.1 - 4.4) What kind of media do you use for searching information about companies?
74
Newspaper /Magazine
Television
Radio
Other: Please specify
5.1 - 5.15) What types of companies do you follow on social media? Choose at least one
possibility, the number of answers is unlimited.
Accommodation
Airlines
Alcohol
Automobile
Beauty
Beverages
Electronics
Fashion
Finance
Industrial
Retail food
Software
Other: Please specify
6) Approximately, how many fashion companies do you follow on social media?
0
1
2-4
5-10
More than 10
7) How many times per week do you visit pages of fashion companies you follow on social
media? (Please tick whichever category comes closest to the number of times you visit
the companies’ pages on social media)
Multiple times a day
At least once a day
Once a week
75
Not even once a week
I do not know/ I am not sure
8) What were your reasons for following these fashion brands on social media?
9.1 - 9.6) Please rank following statements upwardly in order of your preference and
interest in following fashion brands on social media. The highest preference will be ranked
with “1.”, whereas the lowest with “6".
To get discounts or coupons or free products
Purchasing products / Current customer
To reading reviews and product rankings
To get general information
To get exclusive information
To learn about new products
10.1 - 10.3) When you begin to follow a fashion brand, how likely are you to do? (Use
scale of 1 = Never, 2=Sometimes, 3= Usually, 4=Always)
Recommend brand to others.
Never
Sometimes
Usually
Always
Consider that brand if you are going to buy a certain product
Never
Sometimes
Usually
Always
Buy the product from the brand.
Never
Sometimes
Usually
Always
76
11.1 - 11.11) How exactly did you become an online follower/ fan of a fashion brand?
Choose at least one and maximum of three possibilities.
I became a fan after using a brand
A friend of mine recommended it
I search for a brand in the search engine of the social network site
Via online advertising on a social network site
I want to buy a brand in the future
I received an invitation from a person of my contact list
Via online advertising on another site
I received an invitation from the brand/ company itself
Via advertising in traditional media like television, radio and magazine etc.
Other: Please specify
I don’t remember
12) Has an online experience ever influenced whether or not you bought product from
a fashion brand?
Yes
No
When on a fashion brand’s Facebook profile, how often do you do the following
activities?
14) Read posts that are published by the company.
Never
Sometimes
Often
Very often
15) Read comments from fans of the brand.
Never
Sometimes
Often
Very often
Always
Not sure
16) Respond to fan comments.
77
Never
Sometimes
Often
Very often
Always
Not sure
17) Put a comment on the brand’s wall.
Never
Sometimes
Often
Very often
Always
Not sure
18) Watch videos
Never
Sometimes
Often
Very often
Always
Not sure
19) Participate in competitions
Never
Sometimes
Often
Very often
Always
Not sure
How does your interaction with a company affect your feelings towards that company?
(1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree)
20) I follow this company, because I like their products more than other companies‘.
Strongly agree
78
Agree
Neither agree nor disagree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
21) The special offer posted by company on their website is important element during
decision to buy this product.
Strongly agree
Agree
Neither agree nor disagree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
22) The fact that I am following some fashion brands on the Facebook doesn’t mean
that I am going to buy their products.
Strongly agree
Agree
Neither agree nor disagree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
23) Have you ever shared content (pictures/ videos) published by the company on its
online fan page?
Yes
No
24) What has motivated you to share pictures/ videos about products and a fashion
brand that you follow on social media?
It is funny.
It is helpful.
It made me feel some kind of expression.
This is what I think about that.
I knew it first.
Other: Please specify
79
Use scale of 1 (strongly agree) to 5 (strongly disagree) to indicate your level of
agreement/ disagreement with each of the following statements related to sharing
content (pictures/videos) posted online by fashion companies.
25) I share it, because it brings valuable and entertaining content to others.
Strongly agree
Agree
Neither agree nor disagree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
26) I share to define myself to others.
Strongly agree
Agree
Neither agree nor disagree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
27) I share to show someone else that I am thinking about them and that I care.
Strongly agree
Agree
Neither agree nor disagree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
28) I share to feel valuable in the eyes of others.
Strongly agree
Agree
Neither agree nor disagree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
29) I share to spread information about a brand I believe in.
80
Strongly agree
Agree
Neither agree nor disagree
Disagree
Strongly disagree
30) If you share information about fashion products and fashion brands online, how you
would describe the vast majority of content that you share?
Positive
Neutral
Negative
I am not sure
31.1 - 31.8) What exactly do you share about fashion products, brands and/or
companies?
positive experiences that others had
feedback about products/services that others received from a fashion company
the launch of a new fashion product, brand or company
promotions that others saw
negative experience that others had
games and contests related to the fashion products, brands or companies
online advertising that others saw or heard
other: please specify
32) How do you perceive current marketing activities of fashion companies on their
social media pages?
Useful and interesting
I don’t have any special feeling about it
I don’t bother looking at it
Other: Please specify
33) What is your gender?
Male
Female
81
34) What is your age?
15-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
55+
35) What is the highest degree or level of school you have completed?
No education
Primary/ elementary school
Uncompleted secondary education
Completed secondary education
Bachelor’s/ Master’s degree
Doctorate degree
Other:
36) Employment Status: Are you currently…?
Employed full time
Employed part time
Self-employed
Stay-at-home /Parent
A student
Retired
Unemployed
Other:
82
Bibliography:
Literature:
1. Baird, C. and Parasnis, G. (2011). From social media to social customer
relationship management.Strategy \& Leadership, 39(5), pp.30--37.
2. Berthon, P., Pitt, L., Plangger, K. and Shapiro, D. (2012). Marketing meets Web
2.0, social media, and creative consumers: Implications for international
marketing strategy. Business Horizons, 55(3), pp.261--271.
3. Beuker, R. and Abbing, E. (2010). Two Faces of Social Media: Brand
Communication and Brand Research. Design Management Review, 21(1),
pp.54--60.
4. Blaxter, L., Hughes, C. and Tight, M. (2010). How to research. 1st ed.
Maidenhead: Open University Press/McGraw-Hill Education.
5. Brodie, R., Ilic, A., Juric, B. and Hollebeek, L. (2013). Consumer engagement in
a virtual brand community: An exploratory analysis. Journal of Business
Research, 66(1), pp.105--114.
6. Bryman, A. (2012). Social research methods. 4th ed. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
7. Chen, Y., Fay, S. and Wang, Q. (2011). The role of marketing in social media:
How online consumer reviews evolve. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 25(2),
pp.85--94.
8. Costa, R. (2013). The Effects of Online Brand Communities on Brand Equity in
the Luxury Fashion Industry. International Journal of Engineering Business
Management Special Issue on Innovations in Fashion Industry. [online]
Available at: http://cdn.intechopen.com/pdfs-wm/45560.pdf [Accessed 29 May.
2014].
9. Dellarocas, C. (2003). The digitization of word of mouth: Promise and challenges
of online feedback mechanisms. Management science, 49(10), pp.1407--1424.
10. De Vries, L., Gensler, S. and Leeflang, P. (2012). Popularity of brand posts on
brand fan pages: an investigation of the effects of social media
marketing. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 26(2), pp.83--91.
11. Doç, Y. and Ulusu, Y. (2010) ‘Determinant factors of time spent on Facebook:
brand community engagement and usage types’ Journal of Yaşar University,
18(5) 2949-2957.
12. Socialbakers.com. Inspiration from the Fashion Industry On Social Media. [on
line]. socialbakers.com, [Accessed 30 July. 2014].
83
13. "Finding Success with Social Media", 2010, Marketing Weekly News, , pp. 80.
14. Friege, C., Gensler, S., Rangaswamy, A., Skiera, B., Malthouse, E.C., Lobschat,
L. & Hennig-Thurau, T.( 2010). "The impact of new media on customer
relationships", Journal of service research, vol. 13, no. 3, pp. 311-330.
15. Gummerus, J., Liljander, V., Weman, E. and Pihlstr\"om, M. (2012). Customer
engagement in a Facebook brand community. Management Research Review,
35(9), pp.857--877.
16. Habibi, M., Laroche, M. and Richard, M. (2014). The roles of brand community
and community engagement in building brand trust on social media. Computers
in Human Behavior, 37, pp.152--161.
17. Heinonen, K. (2011). Consumer activity in social media: Managerial approaches
to consumers' social media behavior. Journal of Consumer Behaviour, 10(6),
pp.356--364.
18. Heinonen, K. (n.d.). Social Media Activities: Understanding What Consumers Do
in Social Media.
19. Hutton, G. and Fosdick, M. (2011). The globalization of social media consumer
relationships with brands evolve in the digital space. Journal of advertising
research, 51(4), pp.566 - 570.
20. Kim, A. and Ko, E. (2012). Do social media marketing activities enhance
customer equity? An empirical study of luxury fashion brand. Journal of Business
Research, 65(10), pp.1480--1486.
21. Kozinets, R.V. (1999). "E-tribalized marketing?: the strategic implications of
virtual communities of consumption", European Management Journal, vol. 17,
no. 3, pp. 252-264.
22. Krishnamurthy, S. and Dou, W. (2008). Note from special issue editors:
advertising with user-generated content: a framework and research
agenda. Journal of Interactive Advertising, 8(2), pp.1--4.
23. Mohr, I. (2013). The Impact of Social Media on the Fashion Industry. Journal of
Applied Business and Economics, 15(2), pp.17--22.
24. Moran, E. 2010. Marketing in a hyper-social world – The tribalization of business
study and characteristics of successful online communities. Journal of
Advertising Research,: 232–239. doi:10.2501/S0021849910091397
25. Muk, A., Chung, C. and Kim, J. (2014). A Cross-National Study of the Influence
of Individualism and Collectivism on Liking Brand Pages. Journal of International
Consumer Marketing, 26(2), pp.122--137.
84
26. Paquette, H. (2013). Social Media as a Marketing Tool: A Literature Review.
Major Papers by Master of Science Students. Paper 2. http:
//digitalcommons.uri.edu/ tmd_major_papers / 2
27. Poyry, E., Parvinen, P. & Malmivaara, T. (2013). "The Power of 'Like' --
Interpreting Usage Behaviors in Company-Hosted Facebook Pages", IEEE, , pp.
2773.
28. Saravanakumar, M. and Suganthalakshmi, T. (2012). Social media
marketing. Life Science Journal, 9(4), pp.4444--4451.
29. Shao, G. (2009). Understanding the appeal of user-generated media: a uses
and gratification perspective. Internet Research, 19(1), pp.7--25.
30. Sashi, C.M, (2012) ‘Customer engagement, buyer-seller relationships, and
social media’ Department of Marketing, Florida Atlantic University, 50(2):253-
272
31. STELZNER, M. (2014). 2014 SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING INDUSTRY
REPORT. 1st ed. [ebook] Available at:
http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/SocialMediaMarketingIndustryReport201
4.pdf [Accessed 30 Jul. 2014].
32. Shao, G. (2009) ‘Understanding the Appeal of User-Generated Media: A Uses
and Gratification Perspective’. Internet Research 19(1): 7-25
33. Zailskaite-Jakste, L. and Kuvykaite, R. (2012). Consumer Engagement in Social
Media by Building the Brand.
34. Wolny, J. and Mueller, C. (2013). Analysis of fashion consumers’ motives to
engage in electronic word-of-mouth communication through social media
platforms. Journal of Marketing Management, 29(5-6), pp.562--583.
Internet sources:
1. Corcoran, C. (2014). The Social Media Revolution. WWD, [online] 198(20), p.10.
Available at:
http://costello.pub.hb.se/login?url=http://search.proquest.com.lib.costello.pub.h
b.se/docview/231232729?accountid=9670.
2. Digital Firefly Marketing, (2014). Social Media Trends: Why do people follow a
brand?. [online] Available at: https://digitalfireflymarketing.com/social-media-
trends-why-do-people-follow-brand [Accessed 27 Jul. 2014].
85
3. Venus, (2013). The top 5 reasons women share online. [online] Available at:
http://helloimvenus.com/the-top-5-reasons-women-share-online/ [Accessed 27
Jul. 2014].
4. Zemni, H. (2012). Social Media around the World in One Day at STIMA Trends
Night.